This is a digital copy of a book that was preserved for generations on library shelves before it was carefully scanned by Google as part of a project
to make the world's books discoverable online.
It has survived long enough for the copyright to expire and the book to enter the public domain. A public domain book is one that was never subject
to copyright or whose legal copyright term has expired. Whether a book is in the public domain may vary country to country. Public domain books
are our gateways to the past, representing a wealth of history, culture and knowledge that's often difficult to discover.
Marks, notations and other marginalia present in the original volume will appear in this file - a reminder of this book's long journey from the
publisher to a library and finally to you.
Usage guidelines
Google is proud to partner with libraries to digitize public domain materials and make them widely accessible. Public domain books belong to the
public and we are merely their custodians. Nevertheless, this work is expensive, so in order to keep providing this resource, we have taken steps to
prevent abuse by commercial parties, including placing technical restrictions on automated querying.
We also ask that you:
+ Make non-commercial use of the files We designed Google Book Search for use by individuals, and we request that you use these files for
personal, non-commercial purposes.
+ Refrain from automated querying Do not send automated queries of any sort to Google's system: If you are conducting research on machine
translation, optical character recognition or other areas where access to a large amount of text is helpful, please contact us. We encourage the
use of public domain materials for these purposes and may be able to help.
+ Maintain attribution The Google "watermark" you see on each file is essential for informing people about this project and helping them find
additional materials through Google Book Search. Please do not remove it.
+ Keep it legal Whatever your use, remember that you are responsible for ensuring that what you are doing is legal. Do not assume that just
because we believe a book is in the public domain for users in the United States, that the work is also in the public domain for users in other
countries. Whether a book is still in copyright varies from country to country, and we can't offer guidance on whether any specific use of
any specific book is allowed. Please do not assume that a book's appearance in Google Book Search means it can be used in any manner
anywhere in the world. Copyright infringement liability can be quite severe.
About Google Book Search
Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers
discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web
at |http : //books . google . com/
3 3433 071 3871 1> o
k
';;,.■ ^,.
^.^
■ \
])-*,«, «*<* R**'-
o-s>
A5>
L
^
THE NEW YORK PUBUC UBRARY
GIRCUIATION DBrAATMBNT
CENTRAL COLLECTION
5th AVENUE AND 42nd STREET
Any resident ol the citr of New York brin|*
ln| proper referenoOf may borrow books for
home use. «.
Adults may borrow At one time four volumes
(only one ol which shall be fiction) end e
current me^sa^e; children may borrow two
volumes et one time*
No book shall be kept out more than two
weeks— and some are limited to one week*
Current magazines may be kept only three
days* For books kept over time a fine ol one
cent for each day is incurred. Books not re-
turned will be sent for at THE COST OF
THE BORROWER, who can ndt'take another
book until all charges are paid*
Any two-week book, except such as are
marked "not renewable/' may be renewed
ONCE for an additional two weeks, if appli-
cation is made.
The library hours, for the delivery and re-
turn ol books, are from 9 a. m. to 9 p. m. on
week days*
W^ Borrowers findln| this book pencil-
marked, written upon, mutilated or unwar-
rantably defaced, are expected to report It to
the librarian*
ffnrni Ml« (ll-ffr-]« tOBil
r
^
w
I ^w V
c^i-^c
COB
YORKSHIRE
DALES Alfe FELLS
#
A COMPANION YOLUMK
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
YORKSHIRE
COAST AND MOORLAND SCENES
Bt GORDON HOME
CONTAINTNG 33 FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS
IN COLOUR
PRICE 7a. 6d. NET
The Pall afaU Oaietk says : "We must express
reproduce some specingns of the charming illus-
trations, which are at Wat as great an atft-actioa
as the writing o^Mr. Home's book. Of these there
are thirty-two, among which it would be invidious
to select any for si «cial commendation when all
are deUghtful. Let it suffice to say that they bring
the water of envy into the mouth of the Londoner
who can only ' babble o' green fields,' while, beyond
the rarige of his opportunities, the YorldSiire moors
are clothing th«roselTes in all the gloi^Mf their
may tempt some of us to spend the tumlier
holidays in the oounty of .the White Rose. Vi^n
he has gathered ^ fragrant a posy."
A. ft C BiACR . SOHO Square . London . W.
AGENTS IN AMERICA
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
64 ft 66 Fifth Avenue^ Nkw York*
/
THE NEW YORK
I PUBLIC L%<AhY
ASffOR, LENOX AND
Ll|^£N f OUi^DATIONS
/
FOUNTAINS ABBEY
Is one of the finest ruined monasteries in England, and
its wonderfully rich setting in the sylvan splendours
of Studley Roval make it still more noteworthy. The
velvet t\m, the rushing waters of the Skell, the
magnificent trees, and the solemnity of the ruins,
combine in producing an inefbceable memory.
Yorkshire
DALES AND FELLS
PAINTED ^
DESCRIBED
BY
GORDON. 'HOME
' -. ■• . *•' '-.I/.- -
*.<-
PUBLISHED BY A. ^ C.
BLACK • LONDON • MCMVI
?
TRANS. TO CFNTF.AL PT^^Vt
THE NEW T«RK
PUBLIC LWKARY
281769B
ABTOB. UNOX ANB
IBMN V««M)AT10NB
, • • • •
• •• • •
• ••••••
• • • , ••
*^ • •* * m *
\\\ . . • •
• • • .
• • "•• '
Preface
This book is a companion volume to that entitled
* Yorkshire Coast and Moorland Scenes/ which was
published in 1904.
It describes a tract of country that is more &11
of noble and imposing scenery than the north-
eastern comer of the county, although it has none
of the advantages of a coast-line. Beyond this,
the area covered by the present volume is larger
than that of the earlier one, and the historic
events connected with its great over-lords and
their castles, with the numerous monasteries and
ancient towns, are so fiiU of thrilling interest that
it has only been possible to sample here and there
the vast stores of romance that exist in some
hundreds of volumes of early and modem writings.
I
I
GORDON HOME.
Epsom,
AprU, 1906.
-i=j:hS^0-^Q
Contents
CHAFIER I PAGE
The Dale Country as a whole 1
CHAPTER 11
Richmond 13
CHAPTER 111
SWALEDALB 47
CHAPTER IV
Wenslbydale 71
CHAPTER V
RiPON and Fountains Abbey 115
CHAPTER VI
Knaresborouoh and Harrogate 125
CHAPTER Vll
Wharfedale 139
CHAPTER Vlll
Skipton, Malham^ and Gordale 149
CHAPTER IX
Settle and the Inoleton Felu l65
Index 173
vu
List of Illustrations
1. Fountains Abbey Froniispiece
2. Richmond Castle from the River .... 20
3. Richmond from the West SO
4. Swaledale in the Early Autumn 48
5. Downholme Moor^ above Swaledale . , , , 56
6. Muker on a Stormy Afternoon 64
7. Twilight in the Buttei^tubs Pass .... 72
8. Hardraw Force 78
9. A Rugged View above Wensleydale .... 82
10. A Jacobean House at Askrigg 90
11. Aysgarth Force 98
12. Bolton Castle, Wensleydale 104
18. View up Wensleydale from Ley bum Shawl .110
14. Ripon Minster from the South 118
15. Knaresborough 126
16. Bolton Abbey, Wharfedale 142
17. Hubberhohne Church 144
18. The Courtyard of Skipton Castle . .150
19. GordaleScar l60
20. Settle 166
THE DALE COUNTRY AS A WHOLE
PROPERTY OF
THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
CHAPTER I
DESCRIBES THE DALE COUNTRY AS A WHOLE
When in the early years of life one learns for the
first time the name of that range of mountains
forming the backbone of England, the youthful
scholar looks forward to seeing in later years the
prolonged series of lofty hills known as the 'Pennine
Range.' His imagination pictiu'es Pen-y-ghent and
Ingleborough as great peaks, seldom free from a
mantle of clouds, for are they not called * moun-
tains of the Pennine Range/ and do they not appear
in almost as large type in the school geography as
Snowdon and Ben Nevis ? But as the scholar grows
older and more able to travel, so does the Pennine
Range recede from his vision, until it becomes almost
as remote as those crater-strewn moimtains in the
Moon which have a name so similar.
This elusiveness on the part of a natural feature
so essentially static as a mountain range is attribu-
table to the total disregard of the name of this
8 1—2
4 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
particular chain of hills. In the same way as the
term ^Cmnbrian HiUs' is exchanged for the popular
' Lake District/ so is a large section of the Pennine
Range paradoxically known as the ^Yorkshire
Dales.'
It is because the hills are so big that the valleys
are deep, and it is owing to the great watersheds
that these long and narrow dales are beautified by
some of the most copious and picturesque rivers
in England. In spite of this, however, when one
climbs any of the fells over 2,000 feet, and looks
over the mountainous ridges on every side, one
sees, as a rule, no peak or isolated height of any
description to attract one's attention. Instead of
the rounded or angular projections from the horizon
that are usually associated with a mountainous
district, there are great expanses of brown table-
land that form themselves into long parallel lines
in the distance, and give a sense of wild desolation
in some ways more striking than the peaks of
Scotland or Wales. The thick formations of mill-
stone grit and limestone that rest upon the shale
have generally avoided crumpling or distortion, and
thus give the mountain views the appearance of
having had all the upper smfaces rolled flat when
they were in a plastic condition. Denudation and
THE MOORLAND SCENERY 6
the action of ice in the glacial epochs have worn
through the hard upper stratum, and formed the
long and narrow dales ; and in Littondale, Wharfe-
dale, Wensleydale, and many other parts, one may
plainly see the perpendicular wall of rock sharply
defining the upper edges of the valleys. The softer
rocks below generally take a gentle slope from the
base of the hard gritstone to the river-side pastures
below. At the edges of the dales, where waterfalls
pour over the wall of limestone — as at Hardraw
Scar, near Hawes — ^the action of water is plainly
demonstrated, for one can see the rapidity with
which the shale crumbles, leaving the harder rocks
overhanging above.
Unlike the moors of the north-eastern parts of
Yorkshire, the fells are not prolific in heather. It
is possible to pass through Wensleydale — or, indeed,
most of the dales — ^without seeing any heather at
all. On the broad plateaux between the dales
there are stretches of moor partially covered with
ling; but in most instances the fells and moors
are grown over at their higher levels with bent
and coarse grass, generally of a browny-ochrish
colour, broken here and there by an outcrop of
limestone that shows gray against the swarthy
vegetation.
YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
In the upper portions of the dales — even in the
narrow river-side pastures — ^the fences are of stone,
turned a very dark colour by exposure, and every-
where on the slopes of the hills a wide network of
these enclosures can be seen traversing even the
most precipitous ascents. Where the dales widen
out towards the fat plains of the Vale of York,
quickset hedges intermingle with the gaunt stone,
and as one gets further eastwards the green hedge
becomes triumphant The stiles that are the fashion
in the stone-fence districts make quite an interesting
study to strangers, for, wood being an expensive
luxury, and stone being extremely cheap, every-
thing is formed of the more enduring material
Instead of a trap-gate, one generally finds an exces-
sively narrow opening in the fences, only just giving
space for the thickness of the average knee, and
thus preventing the passage of the smallest lamb.
Some stiles are constructed with a large flat stone
projecting from each side, one slightly in front
and overlapping the other, so that one can only
pass through by making a very carefrd S-shaped
movement. More common are the projecting
stones, making a flight of precarious steps on each
side of the wall.
Except in their lowest and least mountainous
THE STONE ROOFS 7
parts, where they are subject to the influences of
the plains, the dales are entirely innocent of red
tiles and haystacks. The roots of churches, cottages,
bams and mansions, are always of the local stone,
that weathers to beautiful shades of green and
gray, and prevents the works of man from jarring
with the great sweeping hillsides. Then, instead
of the &miliar gray-brown haystack, one sees in
almost every meadow a neatly-built stone house
with an upper story. The lower part is generally
used as a shelter for cattle, while above is stored
hay or straw. By this system a huge amount of
unnecessary carting is avoided, and where roads
are few and generally of exceeding steepness a
saving of this nature is a benefit easily understood.
Any soldier who served in South Africa during
the latter part of the war would be struck with
the advantages that these ready-made block-houses
would offer if it were ever necessary to round up
a mobile enemy who had taken refrige among the
Yorkshire fells. Barbed-wire entanglements, and a
system of telephones to link them together, would
be all that was required to convert these stone
bams into block-houses of a thoroughly useful
type, for they are already loopholed.
The villages of the dales, although having none
8 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
of the bright colours of a level country, are often
exceedingly quaint, and rich in soft shades of green
and gray. In the autumn the mellowed tints of
the stone houses are contrasted with the fierce
yellows and browny-reds of the foliage, and the
villages become ftill of bright colours. At all times,
except when the country is shrivelled by an icy
northern wind, the scenery of the dales has a
thousand charms. By the edge of fine rivers that
pour downwards in terraced falls one finds hamlets
with their church towers, gray and sturdy, and
the little patch of green shaded by ash-trees, all
made diminutive by the huge and gaunt hillsides
that dominate every view. Looking up the dales,
there are often glimpses of distant heights that in
their blue silhouettes give a more mountainous
aspect to the scenery than one might expect
In some of the valleys, such as Swaledale, the
nakedness of the yellow-brown hills is clothed with
a mantle of heavy woods — but enough has been
said by way of introduction to give some notion of
the general aspect of the dales, and in the succeeding
chapters a closer scrutiny can be made.
The ways of approaching the Dale Country firom
the south are by means of the Great Northern,
Midland, or Great Central routes to York, where
ROUTES TO THE DALE COUNTRY 9
one has all the North-Eastem service to choose
from. Ribblesdale is traversed by the Midland
Main Line, so that those who wish to commence
an exploration of these parts of Yorkshire from
Settle, Skipton, or Hawes, must travel from
St. Fancras Station.
RICHMOND
2—2
CHAPTER II
RICHMOND
FoK the purposes of this book we may consider
Richmond as the gateway of the dale country.
There are other gates and approaches, some of
which may have advocates who claim their
superiority over Richmond as starting-places for
an exploration of this description, but for my
part, I can find no spot on any side of the moun-
tainous region so entirely satisfactory. If we were
to commence at Bedale or Leybum, there is no
exact point where the open country ceases and the
dale begins ; but here at Richmond there is not the
very smallest doubt, for on reaching the foot of
the mass of rock dominated by the castle and the
town, Swaledale commences in the form of a
narrow ravine, and from that point westwards the
valley never ceases to be shut in by steep sides,
which become narrower and grander with every
mile.
18
14 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
The railway that keeps Richmond in touch with
the world does its work in a most inoffensive
manner, and by running to the bottom of the hill
on which the town stands, and by there stopping
short, we seem to have a strong hint that we have
been brought to the edge of a new element in
which railways have no rights whatever. This is
as it should be, and we can congratulate the North-
Eastem Company for its discretion and its sense
of fitness. Even the station is built of solid stone-
work, with a strong flavour of medievalism in its
design, and its attractiveness is enhanced by the
complete absence of other modem buildings. We
are thus welcomed to the charms of Richmond at
once. The rich sloping meadows by the river,
crowned with dense woodlands, surround us and
form a beautiful setting of green for the town,
which has come down from the fEUitastic days of
the Norman Conquest without any drastic or un-
seemly changes, and thus has still the compactness
and the romantic outline of feudal times.
By some means Richmond avoided the manu-
fEu^tories that have entirely altered the character
of such places as Skipton and Durham, but if we
wish to see what might have happened or what
may still befall this town, it is only necessary for
A ROMANTIC TOWN 15
us to go a little way above the new bridge, and
there, beneath the castle heights, see one of the
most conspicuously and unnecessarily ugly gas-
works that was ever dumped upon a fiur scene.
I suppose a day will arrive when the Mayor and
Corporation will lay their heads together with the
object of devising a plan for the removal of these
dismal buildings to some site where they will be
less offensive, but until that day they will continue
to mar the charms of a town whose situation is
almost unequalled in this island.
From whatever side you approach it, Richmond
has always some fine combination of towers over-
looking a confusion of old red roofs and of rocky
heights crowned with ivy-mantled walls, all set in
the most sumptuous surroundings of silvery river
and wooded hills, such as the artists of the age of
steel-engraving loved to depict. Every one of
these views has in it one dominating feature in
the magnificent Norman keep of the castle. It
overlooks church towers and everything else with
precisely the same aloofness of manner it must
have assumed as soon as the builders of nearly
eight hundred years ago had put the last stone in
place. Externally, at least, it is as complete to-
day as it was then, and as there is no ivy upon it»
(
16 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
I cannot help thinking that the Bretons who built
it in that long-distant time would swell with pride
were they able to see how their ambitious work
has come down the centuries unharmed.
We can go across the modem bridge, with its
castellated parapets, and climb up the steep ascent
on the further side, passing on the way the parish
church, standing on the steep ground outside the
circumscribed limits of the wall that used to en-
close the town in early times. Turning towards
the castle, we go breathlessly up the cobbled street
that climbs resolutely to the market-place in a
foolishly direct fashion, which might be understood
if it were a Roman road. There is a sleepy quiet-
ness about this way up from the station, which is
quite a short distance, and we look for much
movement and human activity in the wide space
we have reached ; but here, too, on this warm and
sunny afternoon, the few folks who are about seem
to find ample time for conversation and loitering.
At the fiirther end of the great square there are
some vast tents erected close to the big obelisk
that forms the market-cross of the present day.
Quantities of straw are spread upon the cobbles,
and the youth of Richmond watches with intense
interest the bulgings of the canvas walls of the
THE SHOPS IN TRINITY CHURCH 17
tents. With this they are obliged to be content
for a time, but just as we reach this end of the
square two huge swaying elephants issue forth to
take their afternoon stroll in company with their
son, whose height is scarcely more than half that
of his parents. The children have not waited in
vain, and they gaze awe-struck at the furrowed
sides of the slate-gray monsters as they are led,
slowly padding their way, across the square. We
watch them as tl^ey pass under the shadow of
Holy Trinity Church, then out in the sunshine
again they go lurching past the old-fashioned
houses until they turn down Frenchgate and dis-
appear, with the excited but respectful knot of
children following close behind.
On one side of us is the King's Head, whose
steep tiled roof and square front has just that air
of respectable importance that one expects to find
in an old-established English hotel. It looks across
the cobbled space to the curious block of buildings
that seems to have been intended for a church but
has relapsed into shops. The shouldering of secular
buildings against the walls of churches is a sight so
familiar in parts of France that this market-place
has an almost Continental flavour, in keeping with
the &ct that Richmond grew up under the pro-
8
18 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
tection of the formidable castle built by that Alan
Rufiis of Brittany who was the Conqueror's second
cousin. The town ceased to be a possession of the
Dukes of .Brittany in the reign of Richard II,,
but there had evidently been sufficient time to
allow French ideals to percolate into the minds
of the men of Richmond, for how otherwise can
we account for this strange familiarity of shops
with a sacred building which is unheard of in any
other English town ? Where else can one find a
pork-butcher's shop inserted between the tower
and the nave, or a tobacconist doing business in
the aisle of a church ? Even the lower parts of
the tower have been given up to secular uses, so
that one only realizes the existence of the church
by keeping far enough away to see the sturdy
pinnacled tower that rises above the desecrated
lower portions of the building. In this tower
hangs the curfew-bell, which is rung at 6 a.m. and
8 p.m., a custom, according to one writer, * that has
continued ever since the time of William the Con-
queror.' The bell, we know, is not Norman, and
the tower belongs to the Perpendicular period,
but the church is referred to in Norman times,
and Leland, writing in the reign of Henry VIII.,
suggests an earlier survival. He may, of course.
A TEMPLE OF ^IDOLES' 19
be describing Norman grotesque carvings, but, on
the other hand, he may be recording some relics
of a more barbarous age when he writes : * There
is a Chapel in Itichenumt Toune with straung
Figures in the Waulles of it. The Peple there
dreme that it was ons [a temple of] Idoles.' I
wonder if those carved figures were entirely
destroyed in the days of the Commonwealth, or
whether they were merely thrown aside during
some restoration, and are waiting for digging or
building operations to bring them to light.
All the while we have been lingering in the
market-place the great keep has been looking at
us over some old red roofe, and urging us to go on
at once to the finest sight that Richmond can
offer, and, resisting the appeal no longer, we make
our way down a narrow little street leading out
to a walk that goes right round the castle cliffs at
the base of the ivy-draped walls. If this walk
were at Harrogate or Buxton, we can easily
imagine that its charms would be vitiated by
some evidences of a popular recognition of its
attractiveness. There would be a strong orna-
mental iron railing on the exposed side of the
path; there would probably be an automatic-
machine waiting to supply a souvenir picture
»— 2
so YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
post-card of the view ; there would be notices —
most excellent where they are needed — ^requesting
visitors not to throw paper or orange-peel any-
where but in the receptacle supplied ; and, besides
all this, there would, I have no doubt, be orna-
mental shrubberies, and here and there a few beds
of flowers, kept with all the neatness of municipal
horticulture. Such efforts would meet with some
sort of response on the part of the public, and
the castle walk would be sufficiently populous to
prevent anyone from appreciating its charms. No ;
instead of all this we find a simple asphalt path
without any fence at alL There are two or three
seats that are perfectly welcome, but there is a
delightfril absence of shrubberies or flower-beds,
and the notices to the public fixed to the castle
walls are weathered and quite inconspicuous.
Beyond all this, the castle walk is generally a
place in which one can be alone, and yet
* This is not solitude ; 'tis but to hold
Ck>nverse with Nature^s charms, and see those charms unfold."*
From down below comes the sound of the river,
ceaselessly chafing its rocky bottom and the big
boulders that lie in the way. You can distinguish
the hollow soimd of the waters as they faU over
ledges into deep pools, and you can watch the
RICHMOND CASTLE FROM THE RIVER
This wdl-known view of the castle from the banks
of the Swale is only one of the numerous romantic
pictures that can be found in Richmond. The
great Norman keep, built about the year 1150, forms
the dominating feature of every aspect of the town.
N ori- /»
^'v/:r
THE VIEW FROM RICHMOND CASTLE 21
silvery gleams of broken water between the old
stone bridge and the dark shade of the woods.
The masses of trees clothing the side of the gorge
add a note of mystery to the picture by swallowing
up the river in their heavy shade, for, owing to
its sinuous course among the cliffs, one can see
only a short piece of water beyond the bridge.
The old comer of the town at the foot of
Bargate appears over the edge of the rocky slope,
but on the opposite side of the Swale there is little
to be seen beside the green meadows and shady
coppices that cover the heights above the river.
There is a fascination in this view in its capacity
for change. It responds to every mood of the
weather, and every sunset that glows across the
sombre woods has some freshness, some feature
that is quite unlike any other. Autumn, too, is
a memorable time for those who can watch the
face of Nature from this spot, for when one of
those opulent evenings of the fall of the year
turns the sky into a golden sea of glory, studded
with strange purple islands, there is unutterable
beauty in the flaming woods and the pale river.
On the way back to the market-place we pass
a decayed arch that was probably a postern in
the walls of the town. There can be no doubt
22 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
whatever of the existence of these walls, for
Leland begins his description of the town with
the words * Bichemont Towne is waullid,' and in
another place he says: ^Waullid it was, but the
waul is now decayid. The Names and Partes of
4 or 5 Gates yet remained He also tells us the
names of some of these gates : * Frenchegate yn the
North Parte of the Towne, and is the most occupied
Gate of the Towne. Finkel-streate Gate^ Bargate^
all iii be downe.' Leland also details how the
wall enclosed little beside the market-place, the
houses adjoining it, and the gardens behind them,
and that the area occupied by the castle was
practically the same as that of the town. We
wonder why Richmond could not have preserved
her gates as York has done, or why she did not
even make the ejQbrt sufficient to retain a single
one, as Bridlington and Beverley did. The two
posterns — one we have just mentioned, and the
other in Friar's Wynd, on the north side of the
market-place, with a piece of wall 6 feet thick
adjoining — are interesting, but we would have
preferred something much finer than these mere
arches ; and while we are grumbling over what
Richmond has lost, we may also measure the
disaster which befell the market-place in 1771,
VANDALISM AT RICHMOND 23
when the old cross was destroyed. Before that
year there stood on the site of the present obehsk
a very fine cross which Clarkson, who wrote about
a century ago, mentions as being the greatest
beauty of the town to an antiquary. A high
flight of steps led up to a square platform, which
was enclosed by a richly ornamented wall about
6 feet high, having buttresses at the comers, each
surmounted with a dog seated on its hind-legs.
Within the wall rose the cross, with its shaft
made fix)m one piece of stone. There were * many
curious compartments ' in the wall, says Clarkson,
and *a door that opened into the middle of the
square,' but this may have been merely an arched
opening. The enrichments, either of the cross itself
or the wall, included four shields bearing the arms
of the great families of Fitz-Hugh, Scrope (quarter-
ing Tibetot), Conyers, and Neville. From the
description there is little doubt that this cross
was a very beautiful example of Perpendicular or
perhaps Decorated Gothic, in place of which we
have a crude and bulging obelisk bearing the
inscription: 'Rebuilt (!) a.d. 1771, Christopher
Wayne, Esq., Mayor'; it should surely have
read: * Perpetrated during the Mayoralty of
Christopher Wayne, Goth.' The old cross was
34 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
pulled down 'for particular reasons,' says Clark-
son, but, even if those reasons had been valid,
the stones might have been carefully marked, and
the whole structure could have been rebuilt in
some other part of the market-place.
Although, as we have seen, Leland, who wrote
in 1588, mentions Frenchgate and Finkel Street
Gate as 'down,' yet they must have been only
partially destroyed, or were rebuilt afterwards, for
Whitaker, writing in 1828, mentions that they
were pulled down * not many years ago ' to allow
the passage of broad and high-laden waggons.
There can be little doubt, therefore, that, swollen
with success after the demolition of the cross, the
Mayor and Corporation proceeded to attack the
remaining gateways, so that now not the smallest
suggestion of either remains. But even here we
have not completed the list of barbarisms that took
place about this time. The Barley Cross, which
stood near the larger one, must have been quite
an interesting feature. It consisted of a lofty
pillar with a cross at the top, and rings were
fastened either on the shaft or to the steps upon
which it stood, so that the cross might answer the
purpose of a whipping -post. The pillory stood
not far away, and the may-pole is also mentioned.
THE 'FRERES^ OF RICHMOND 26
But despite all this squandering of the treasures
that it should have been the business of the town
authorities to preserve, the tower of the Grey
Friars has survived, and, next to the castle, it is
one of the chief ornaments of the town- Whitaker
is by no means sure of the motives that led to its
preservation — ^perhaps because he knew the Rich-
mond people too well to expect much of them —
for he writes: * Taste, however, or veneration, or
lucky accident, has preserved the great tower of
the "Freres" of Richmond.' Certainly none of
these causes saved any other portions of the
buildings, for the beautiftil Perpendicular tower
stands quite alone. It is on the north side of the
town, outside the narrow limits of the walls, and
was probably only finished in time to witness the
dispersal of the friars who had built it. It is even
possible that it was part of a new church that
was still uicomplete when the Dissolution of the
Monasteries made the work of no account except
as building materials for the townsfolk. The
actual day of the surrender was January 19, 1588,
and we wonder if Robert Sanderson, the Prior,
and the fourteen brethren under him, sujffered
much from the privations that must have attended
them at that coldest period of the year. At
4
«6 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
one time the friars, being of a mendicant order,
and inured to hard living and scanty fare, might
have made light of such a disaster, but in these
later times they had expanded somewhat from
their austere ways of living, and the dispersal
must have cost them much suffering. Almost in
this actual year Leland writes of * their Howse,
Medow, Orchard, and a litle Wood,' which he
mentions as being walled in, and, seeing that the
wall enclosed nearly sixteen acres, it appears
probable that the gray-cloaked men can scarcely
have been ignorant of all the luxuries of life.
Notwithstanding this, they stoutly reftised to
acknowledge the King's supremacy, and suffered
accordingly.
Going back to the reign of Henry VII. or
thereabouts, we come across the curious ballad of
^The Felon Sow of Rokeby and the Freres of
Richmond ' quoted firom an old manuscript by Sir
Walter Scott in * Rokeby.' It may have been
as a practical joke, or merely as a good way of
getting rid of such a terrible beast, that
^ Ralph of Rokeby, with goodwill,
The fryers of Richmond gaver her tilL^
Friar Middleton, who with two lusty men was
THE FELON SOW OF ROKEBY 97
sent to fetch the sow from Rokeby, could scarcely
have known that she was
' The grisliest beast that ere might be,
Her head was great and gray :
She was bred in Rokeby Wood ;
There were few that thither goed.
That came on live [=ative] away.
^ She was so grisley for to meete,
She rave the earth up with her feete,
And bark came fro the tree ;
When fityer Middleton her saugh,
Weet ye well he might not laugh.
Full earnestly look'^d hee.^
To calm the terrible beast when they found it
almost impossible to hold her, the friar began to
read ^ in St. John his Gospell/ but
^ The sow she would not Latin heaie,
But rudely rushed at the frear,^
who, turning very white, dodged to the shelter
of a tree, whence he saw with horror that the
sow had got clear of the other two men. At this
their courage evaporated, and all three fled for
their lives along the Watling Street. When they
came to Richmond and told their tale of the
* feind of hell ' in the garb of a sow, the warden
decided to hire on the next day two of the ^ boldest
4—2
28 YORKSHIBE DALES AND YELLS
men that ever were borne/ These two, Gilbert
Griffin and a * bastard son of Spaine/ went to
Rokeby clad in armour and carrying their shields
and swords of war, and even then they only just
overcame the grisly sow. They lifted the dead
brute on to the back of a horse, so that it rested
across the two panniers,
^ And to Richmond they did hay :
When they saw her come.
They sang merrily Te Deum^
The ftyers on that day.'
If we go across the river by the modem bridge,
we can see the humble remains of St. Martin's
Priory standing in a meadow by the railway. The
ruins consist of part of a Perpendicular tower and
a Norman doorway. Perhaps the tower was built
in order that the Grey Friars might not eclipse
the older foundation, for St. Martin's was a cell
belonging to St. Mary's Abbey at York, and was
founded* by Wyman, steward or dapifer to the
Earl of Richmond about the year 1100, whereas
the Franciscans in the town owed their establish-
ment to Radulph Fitz-Ranulph, a lord of Middle-
ham in 1258. The doorway of St. Martin's, with
its zigzag mouldings, must be part of Wyman's
building, but no other traces of it remain.
INSIDE RICHMOND CASTLE 29
Having come back so rapidly to the Norman age,
we may well stay there for a time while we make
our way over the bridge again and up the steep
ascent of Frenchgate to the castle.
On entering the small outer barbican, which is
reached by a lane firom the market-place, we come
to the base of the Norman keep. Its great height
of nearly 100 feet is quite unbroken from founda-
tions to summit, and the flat buttresses are feature-
less. The recent pointing of the masonry has also
taken away any pronounced weathering, and has
left the tower with almost the same gaunt appear-
ance that it had when Duke Conan saw it com-
pleted. Passing through the arch in the wall
abutting the keep, we come into the grassy space
of over two acres, that is enclosed by the ramparts.
There are some modem quarters for soldiers on the
western side which we had not noticed before, and
the grass is levelled in places for lawn tennis, but we
had not expected to discover imposing views inside
the waUs, where the advantage of the cliffs is lost.
We do find, however, architectural details which
are missing outside. The basement of the keep
was vaulted in a massive fashion in the Decorated
period, but the walls are probably those of the first
Earl Alan, who was the first ^Frenchman' who
80 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
owned the great part of Yorkshire which had
formerly belonged to Edwin, the Saxon EarL It is
not definitely known by what stages the keep
reached its present form, though there is every
reason to believe that Conan, the fifth Earl of Rich-
mond, left the tower externally as we see it to-day.
This puts the date of the completion of the keep
between 1146 and 1171. The floors are now a
store for the uniforms and accoutrements of the
soldiers quartered at Richmond, so that there is
little to be seen as we climb a staircase in the walls,
11 feet thick, and reach the battlemented turrets.
Looking downwards, we gaze right into the
chimneys of the nearest houses, and we see the
old roofe of the town packed closely together in
the shelter of the mighty tower. A few tiny
people are moving about in the market-place, and
there is a thin web of drifting smoke between us
and them. Everything is peaceftil and remote;
even the sound of the river is lost in the wind
that blows freely upon us from the great moor-
land wastes stretching away to the western horizon.
It is a romantic country that lays around us, and
though the cultivated area must be infinitely
greater than in the fighting days when these
battlements were finished, yet I suppose the Vale
RICHMOND FROM THE WEST
Fkom this point of view, a great stretch of fertile
and richly wooded country is seen. The mediaeval-
looking town, perched on its rocky height above one
of the deep windings of the Swale, plainly shows how
its name of the Rich Mount suggested itself. The
castle keep shows most prominently, but to the left
of it can be seen the Grey Friar's Tower and thoee
of the two churches.
.-; N or
THENEWYORK
PUBLIC L ^ hAKY
ASTOR, LENr :'l
TILDEN FOi Ni, S
R L
THE CASTLE CHAPEL 81
of Mowbray which we gaze upon to the east
must have been green, and to some extent fertile,
when that Conan who was Duke of Brittany and
also Earl of Richmond looked out over the
innumerable manors that were his Yorkshire
possessions. I can imagine his eye glancing down
on a far more thrilling scene than the green three-
sided courtyard enclosed by a crumbling gray
wall, though to him the buildings, the men, and
every detail that filled the great space, were no
doubt quite prosaic. It did not thrill him to see
a man-at-arms cleaning weajjons, when the man
and his clothes, and even the sword, were as
modem and everyday as the soldier's wife and
child that we can see ourselves, but how much
would we not give for a half an hour of his vision,
or even a part of a second, with a good camera in
our hands ?
Instead of wasting time on vain thoughts of this
character, it would perhaps be wiser to go down
and examine the actual remains of these times that
have survived all the intervening centuries.
In the lower part of what is called Robin Hood's
Tower is the Chapel of St. Nicholas, with arcaded
walls of early Norman date, and a long and narrow
slit forming the east window. More interesting
88 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
than this is the Norman hall at the south-east
angle of the walls. It was possibly used as the
banqueting-room of the castle, and is remark-
able as being one of the best preserved of the
Norman halls forming separate buildings that are
to be found in this country. The hall is roofless,
but the corbels remain in a perfect state, and the
windows on each side are well preserved. The
builder was probably Earl Conan, for the keep
has details of much the same character. It is
generally called Scolland's Hall, after the Lord of
Bedale of that name, who was a sewer or dapifer
to the first Earl Alan of Richmond. Scolland
was one of the tenants of the Earl, and under the
feudal S3rstem of tenure he took part in the regular
guarding of the castle.
There is probably much Norman work in various
parts of the crumbling curtain walls, and at the
south-west comer a Norman turret is still to be seen.
Unless the Romans established at Catterick had
a station there, it seems very probable that before
the Norman Conquest the actual site of Richmond
was entirely vacant; for, though the Domesday
Survey makes mention of one or two names that
indicate some lost villages in the neighbourhood,
there are no traces in the town of anything earlier
THE FOUNDING OF RICHMOND 88
than the Norman period. No stones of Saxon
origin, so far as evidence exists, have come to light
during any restorations of the churches, and the
only suggestion of anything pre-Norman is Leland's
mention of those * idoles ' that were in his time to
be seen in the walls of Holy Trinity Church.
For some reason this magnificent position for
a stronghold was overlooked by the Saxons, the
seat of their government in this part of York-
shire being at Gilling, less than three miles to the
north. The importance of this place, which is now
nothing more than a village, is shown by the fact
that it gave its name to the Gillingshire of early
times as well as to the wapentakes of Gilling
East and Gilling West. There was no naturally
defensive site for a castle at Gilling, and the new
owners of the land familiar with the enormous
advantages of such sites as Falalse and Domfront
were not slow to discover the bold clijff above the
Swale just to the south. Alan Rufus, one of the
sons of the Duke of Brittany, who received from
the Conqueror the vast possessions of Earl Edwin,
was no doubt the founder of Richmond. He
probably received this splendid reward for his
services soon after the suppression of the Saxon
efforts for liberty under the northern Earls.
5
84 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELI^
William, having crushed out the rebellion in the
remorseless fashion which finally gave him peace
in his new possessions, distributed the devas-
tated Saxon lands among his supporters; thus a
great part of the earldom of Mercia fell to this
Breton.
The site of Richmond was fixed as the new
centre of power, and the name, with its apparently
obvious meaning, may date from that time, unless
the suggested Anglo-Saxon derivation which gives
it as Rice-munt — ^the hill of rule — ^is correct. After
this Gilling must soon have ceased to be of any
account There can be little doubt that the castle
was at once planned to occupy the whole area
enclosed by the walls as they exist to-day, although
the full strength of the place was not realized until
the time of the fifth Earl, who, as we have seen,
was most probably the builder of the keep in its
final form, as well as other parts of the castle.
Richmond must then have been considered almost
impregnable, and this may account for the fact
that it appears to have never been besieged. In
1174, when William the Lion of Scotland was
invading England, we are told in Jordan Fantosme's
Chronicle that Henry II., anxious for the safety
of the honour of Richmond, and perhaps of its
THE VICISSITUDES OF THE CASTLE 86
custodian as well, asked : * Randulf de Glanvile est-
il en Richemunt?' The King was in France, his
possessions were threatened from several quarters,
and it would doubtless be a rdief to him to know
that a stronghold of such importance was imder
the personal command of so able a man as
Glanville. In July of that year the danger from
the Scots was averted by a victory at Alnwick, in
which fight Glanville was one of the chief com-
manders of the English, and he probably led the
men of Richmondshire.
It is a strange thing that Richmond Castle,
despite its great pre-eminence, should have been
allowed to become a ruin in the reign of
Edward III. — a time when castles had obviously
lost none of the advantages to the barons which
they had possessed in Norman times. The only
explanation must have been the divided interests
of the owners, for, as Dukes of Brittany, as well
as Earls of Richmond, their English possessions
were frequently endangered when France and
England were at war. And so it came about
that when a Duke of Brittany gave his support
to the King of France in a quarrel with the
EngUsh, his possessions north of the Channel
became Crown property. How such a condition
5—2
86 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
of affairs could have continued for so long is
difficult to understand, but the final severing came
at last, when the unhappy Bichard II. was on the
throne of England. The honour of Richmond
then passed to Ralph Neville, the first Earl of
Westmoreland, but the title was given to Edmund
Tudor, whose mother was Queen Catherine, the
widow of Henry V, Edmund Tudor, as all know,
married Margaret Beaufort, the heiress of John of
Gaunt, and died about two months before his wife
— ^then scarcely fourteen years old — ^gave birth to
his only son, who succeeded to the throne of
England as Henry VII. He was Earl of Rich-
mond from his birth, and it was he who carried
the name to the Thames by giving it to his splendid
palace which he built at Shene. Even the ballad
of * The Lass of Richmond Hill ' is said to come
from Yorkshire, although it is conunonly con-
sidered a possession of Surrey.
Protected by the great castle, there came into
existence the town of Richmond, which grew and
flourished. The houses must have been packed
closely together to provide the numerous people
with quarters inside the wall which was built to
protect the place from the raiding Scots. The
area of the town was scarcely larger than the
PLAGUES AT RICHMOND 87
castle, and although in this way the inhabitants
gained security fixim one danger, they ran a greater
risk from a far more insidious foe, which took the
form of pestilences of a most virulent character.
After one of these visitations the town of Rich-
mond would be left in a pitiable plight. Many
houses would be deserted, and fields became * over-
run with briars, nettles, and other noxious weeds.'
There is a record of the desolation and misery
that was foimd to exist in Richmond during the
reign of Edward III. A plague had carried oft
about 2,000 people ; the Scots, presumably before
the building of the wall, had by their inroads added
to the distress in the town, and the castle was in
such a state of dilapidation as to be worth nothing
a year. In the thirteenth century Richmond had
been the mart of a very large district It was
a great centre for the distribution of com, and
goods were brought from Lancashire, Westmore-
land, and Cumberland to be sold in the market on
Saturdays, ^uch an extensive trade produced a
large class of burgesses, merchants, and craftsmen,
who were sufficiently numerous to form themselves
into no less than thirteen separate guilds. There
were the mercers, grocers, and haberdashers united
into one company ; the glovers and skinners, who
88 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
combined under the name of fellmongers. There
were the butchers, tailors, tanners, blacksmiths, and
cappers, who kept themselves apart as distinct
companies ; and the remaining nineteen trades
were massed together in six guilds, such ill-
assorted people as drapers, vintners, and surgeons
going together. With various charters, giving
all sorts of rights and immunities, these companies
survived the disasters which befell the place,
I although the growth of other market towns, such
I as Bedale, Masham, and Middleham, undermined
their position, and sometimes gave rise to loud
complaints and petitions to be eased of the pay-
ments by which the citizens held their charter.
With keen competition to contend against, the
poor Richmond folk must have thought their lot
a miserable one when a fresh pestilential scoiu'ge
was inflicted upon them.
The first death took place on August 17, 1597,
when Roger Sharp succumbed to a disease which
spread with such rapidity that by December 15 in
the following year 1,050 had died within the parish,
and altogether there were 2,200 deaths in the rural
deanery of Richmond. This plague was by no
means confined to Richmond, and so great was the
mortality that the assizes at Diu*ham were hot held.
MEDIEVAL SPLENDOURS 89
and business generally in the northern parts of
England was paralyzed.
In the Civil War the town was spared the
disaster of a siege, perhaps because the castle was
not in a proper state for defence. If fighting had
occurred, there is little doubt that the keep would
have been partially wrecked, as at Scarborough,
and Richmond would have lost the distinction of
possessing such an imposing feature.
As soon as one digs down a little into the story
of a town with so rich a history as this, it is
tantalizing not to go deeper. One would like to
study every record that throws light on the events
that were associated with the growth of both the
castle and the town, so that one might discard the
mistakes of the earlier writers and build up such
a picture of feudal times as few places in England
could equal. Richmond of to-day is so silent, so
lacking in pageantry, that one must needs go to
some lonely spot, and there dream of all the semi-
barbarous splendours that the old walls have looked
down upon when the cement between the great
stones still bore the marks of the masons' trowels.
One thinks of the days when the occupants of the
castle were newly come from Brittany, when an
alien tongue was heard on this diif above the
40 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Swale, even as had happened when the riverside
echoes had had to accustom themselves to an
earlier change when Romans had laughed and
talked on the same spot. The men one dreams
of are wearing suits of chain mail, or are in the
dress so quaintly drawn in the tapestry at Bayeux,
and they have brought with them their wives, their
servants, and even their dogs. Thus Richmond
began as a foreign town, and the folks ate and
drank and slept as they had always done before
they left France. Much of this alien blood was no
doubt absorbed by the already mixed Anglo-Saxon
and Danish population of Yorkshire, and perhaps,
if his descent could be traced, one would find that
the passer-by who has just disturbed our dreaming
has Breton blood in his veins.
Easby Abbey is so much a possession of Rich-
mond that we cannot go towards the mountains
until we have seen something of its charms. The
ruins slumber in such unutterable peace by the
riverside that the place is well suited to our mood
to go a-dreaming of the centuries which have
been so long dead that our imaginations are not
cumbered with any of the dull times that may
have often set the canons of St. Agatha's yawning.
The walk along the steep shady bank above the
THE RUINS OF EASBY ABBEY 41
river is beautiful all the way, and the surroundings
of the broken walls and traeeried windows are
singularly rich. There is nothing, however, at
Easby that makes a striking pictiure, although
there are many architeetiu'al fragments that are
fiill of beauty. Fountains, Rievaulx and Tintem,
all leave Easby far behind, but there are charms
enough here with which to be content, and it
is, perhaps, a pleasant thought to know that,
although on this sunny afternoon these meadows
by the Swale seem to reach perfection, yet in
the neighboiu*hood of Ripon there is something
still finer waiting for us. Of the abbey church
scarcely more than enough has survived for the
preparation of a ground-plan, and many of the
evidences are now concealed by the grass. The
range of domestic buildings that siurounded the
cloister garth are, therefore, the chief interest,
although these also are broken and roofless. We
can wander among the ivy-grown walls which, in
the refectory, retain some semblance of their original
form, and we can see the pictiu*esque remains of the
common-room, the guest -hall, the chapter-house,
and the sacristy. Beyond the ruins of the north
transept, a corridor leads into the infirmary, which,
besides having an unusual position, is remarkable
6
42 YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
as being one of the most complete groups of
buildings set apart for this object. A noticeable
feature of the cloister garth is a Norman arch
belonging to a doorway that appears to be of later
date. This is probably the only survival of the
first monastery founded, it is said, by Roald,
Constable of Richmond Castle in 1152. Building
of an extensive character was, therefore, in progress
at the same time in these sloping meadows, as
on the castle heights, and St. Martin's Priory,
close to the town, had not long been completed.
Whoever may have been the foimder of the abbey,
it is definitely known that the great family of
Scrope obtained the privileges that had been
possessed by the constable, and they added so
much to the property of the monastery that in
the reign of Henry VIII. the Scropes were con-
sidered the original founders. Easby thus became
the stately burjring-place of the family, and the
splendid tombs that appeared in the choir of their
church were a constant reminder to the canons of
the greatness of the lords of Bolton. Sir Henry
le Scrope was buried beneath a great stone effigy,
bearing the arms — azure, a bend or — of his house.
Near by lay Sir William le Scrope's armed figure,
and round about were many others of the family
THE LOST TOMBS OF THE SCROPES 48
buried beneath flat stones. We know this from
the statement of an Abbot of Easby in the four-
teenth century ; and but for the record of his words
there would be nothing to tell us anything of
these ponderous memorials, which have disappeared
as completely as though they had had no more
permanence than the yellow leaves that are just
beginning to flutter from the trees. The splendid
chiu-ch, the tombs, and even the very family of
Scrope, have disappeared; but across the hills, in
the valley of the Ure, their castle still stands, and in
the little chiu-ch of Wensley there can still be seen
the parclose screen of Perpendicular date that one
of the Scropes must have rescued when the
monastery was being stripped and plimdered.
The fine gatehouse of Easby Abbey, which is
in a good state of preservation, stands a little to
the east of the parish church, and the granary is
even now in use.
On the sides of the parvise over the porch of the
parish church are the arms of Scrope, Conyers,
and Aske; and in the chancel of this extremely
interesting old building there can be seen a series
of wall-paintings, some of which probably date
from the reign of Henry III. This would make
them earlier than those at Pickering.
6—2
SWALEDALE
CHAPTER III
SWALEDALE
There is a certain elevated and wind-swept spot,
scarcely more than a long mile from Richmond,
that commands a view over a wide extent of
romantic country. Vantage-points of this type,
within easy reach of a fair-sized town, are inclined
to be overrated, and, what is far worse, to be spoiled
by the litter of picnic parties ; but Whitcliffe
Scar is free from both objections. In magnificent
September weather one may spend many hours in
the midst of this great panorama without being
disturbed by a single human being, besides a pos
sible farm labourer or shepherd ; and if scraps of
paper and orange-peel are ever dropped here, the
keen winds that come from across the moors dispose
of them as efficaciously as the keepers of any public
parks.
The view is removed from a comparison with
many others from the fact that one is situated at
47
48 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
the dividing-line between the richest cultivation
and the wildest moorlands. WhitclifFe Scar is the
Mount Pisgah fix)m whence the jaded dweller in
towns can gaze into a promised land of solitude,
^ Where things that own not man^s dominion dwell.
And mortal foot hath ne^er or rarely been/
The eastward view of green and smiling country
is undeniably beautifid, but to those who can
appreciate Byron's enthusiasm for the trackless
mountain there is something more indefinable and
inspiring in the mysterious loneliness of the west.
The long, level lines of the moorland horizon, when
the sun is beginning to climb downwards, are cut
out in the softest blue and mauve tints against the
shunmering transparency of the western sky, and
the plantations that clothe the sides of the dale
beneath one are filled with wonderful shadows,
which are thrown out with golden outlines. The
view along the steep valley extends for a few miles,
and then is suddenly cut off by a sharp bend where
the Swale, a silver ribbon along the bottom of the
dale, disappears among the sombre woods and
the shoulders of the hills.
In this aspect of Swaledale one sees its mildest
and most civilized mood; for beyond the purple
SWALEDALE IN THE EARLY AUTUMN
The view is taken from a spot just above Richmond,
known as Willance's Leap. One is looking due
west, with the high mountains of Craven just beyond
the blue plateau.
THB NEW TOBK
PUBLIC Library!
ASTOB, lENOX AKD
I TUDM FOUMDAXIONS
a 1
WILLANCE'S LEAP 49
hillside that may be seen in the illustration, cultiva-
tion becomes more palpably a struggle, and the
gaunt moors, broken by lines of precipitous scars,
assume control of the scenery.
From 200 feet below, where the river is flowing
along its stony bed, comes the sound of the waters
ceaselessly grinding the pebbles, and from the green
pastures there floats upwards a distant ba-baaing.
No railway has penetrated the solitudes of Swale-
dale, and, as far as one may look into the future in
such matters, there seems every possibility of this
loneliest and grandest of the Yorkshire dales retain-
ing its isolation in this respect. None but the
simplest of sounds, therefore, are borne on the
keen winds that come from the moorland heights,
and the purity of the air whispers in the ear the
pleasing message of a land where chimneys have
never been.
Besides the original name of Whitclifie Scar»
this remarkable view-point has, since 1606, been
popularly known as *Willance's Leap.' In that
year a certain Robert Willance, whose father appears
to have been a successful draper in Richmond,
was hunting in the neighbourhood, when he found
himself enveloped in a fog. It must have been
sufficiently dense to shut out even the nearest
7
60 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
objects ; for, without any warning, Willance found
himself on the verge of the scar, and before he
could check his horse both were precipitated over
the clifF, We have no detailed account of whether
the fall was broken in any way ; but, although his
horse was killed instantly, Willance, by some almost
miraculous good fortune, found himself alive at
the bottom with nothing worse than a broken leg.
Such a story must have been the talk of the whole
of the Dale Country for months after the event,
and it is in no way surprising that the spot should
have become permanently associated with the rider's
name. He certainly felt grateftd for his astonishing
escape, despite the amputation of the broken limb ;
for, besides the erection of some inscribed stones
that still mark the position of his fall fix)m the
cliff, Willance, in order to further conunemorate
the event, presented the Corporation of Richmond
with a silver cup, which remains in the possession
of the town.
Turning back towards Richmond, the contrast
of the gently-rounded contours and the rich cul-
tivation gives the landscape the appearance of a
vast garden. One can see the great Norman keep
of the castle dwarfing the church towers, and the
red -roofed houses that cluster so picturesquely
A WONDERFUL VIEW 61
under its shelter. The afternoon sunlight floods
everything with its generous glow, and the shadows
of the trees massed on the hill-slopes are singularly
blue. At the bottom of the valley the Swale
abandons its green meadows for a time, and dis-
appears into the deep and leafy gorge that adds so
much to the charm of Richmond. Beyond the
town the course of the river can be traced as it
takes its way past Easby Abbey and the sunny
slopes crowned with woods that go down on either
side to its sparkling waters, until the level plain
confuses every feature in a maze of hedgerow and
coppice that loses itself in the hazy horizon.
It is a difficult matter to decide which is the
more attractive means of exploring Swaledale ; for
if one keeps to the road at the bottom of the valley
many beautifiil and remarkable aspects of the
country are missed, and yet if one goes over the
moors it is impossible to really explore the recesses
of the dale. The old road from Richmond to Reeth
avoids the dale altogether, except for the last mile,
and its ups and its downs make the traveller pay
handsomely for the scenery by the way.\|But this
ought not to deter anyone from using the road;
for the view of the village of Marske, cosily situate
among the wooded heights that rise above the
7—2
62 YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
beck, is missed by those who keep to the new
road along the banks of the Swale. The romantic
seclusion of this village is accentuated towards
evening, when a shadowy stillness fills the hollows.
The higher woods may be still glowing with the
light of the golden west, while down below a soft-
ness of outline adds beauty to every object. The
old bridge that takes the road to Reeth across
Marske Beck needs no such fault-forgiving light,
for it was standing in the reign of Elizabeth, and,
from its appearance, it is probably centiuies older.
There used to be a quaint little mill close to the
bridge, but this was, unfortunately, swept away
when some alterations were being made in the
surroundings of Marske Hall, a seat of the Huttons.
It was one of this family, in whose hands the manor
of Marske has remained for over 800 years, to
whom the idea occurred of converting what was
formerly a precipitous ravine, with bare rocky scars
on either side, into the heavily wooded and romantic
spot one finds to-day. Beyond the beautifying of
this little branch valley of Swaledale, the Huttons
are a notable family in having produced two Arch-
bishops. They both bore the same name of Matthew
Hutton. The first, who is mentioned by Thomas
Fuller in his * Worthies ' as * a learned Prelate,' was
CONCERNING MARSKE 68
raised to the Archbishopric of York from Durham
in 1594. This Matthew Hutton seems to have
found favour with Elizabeth, for, beyond his rapid
progress in the Church, there is still preserved in
Marske Hall a gold cup presented to him by the
Queen.* The second Archbishop was promoted
fix>m Bangor to York, and finally to Canterbury in
1757.
Rising above the woods near Marske Hall there
appears a tall obelisk, put up to the memory of
Captain Matthew Hutton about a century ago,
when that tjrpe of memorial had gained a prodigious
popularity. An obelisk towering above a planta-
tion can scarcely be considered an attractive feature
in a landscape, for its outline is too strongly sugges-
tive of a mine-shaft ; but how can one hope to find
beauty in any of the architectural efforts of a period
that seems to have been dead to art ?
The new road to Reeth fix)m Richmond goes
down at an easy gradient from the town to the
banks of the river, which it crosses when abreast
of Whitcliffe Scar, the view in front being at first
much the same as the nearer portions of the dale
seen from that height. Down on the left, however,
there are some chimney-shafts, so recklessly black
♦ Murray.
64 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
that they seem to be no part whatever of their
sumptuous natural surroundings, and might ahnost
suggest a nightmare in which one discovered that
some of the vilest chimneys of the Black Country
had taken to touring in the beauty spots of the
country.
As one goes westward, the road penetrates right
into the bold scenery that invites exploration when
viewed from * Willance's Leap.' There is a Scottish
feeling — perhaps Alpine would be more correct —
in the steeply-falling sides of the dale, all clothed
in firs and other dense plantations ; and just where
the Swale takes a decided turn towards the south
there is a view up Marske Beck that adds much to
the romance of the scene. Behind one's back the
side of the dale rises like a dark green wall entirely
in shadow, and down below, half buried in foliage,
the river swirls and laps its gravelly beaches, also
in shadow. Beyond a strip of pastiu*e begin
the tumbled masses of trees which, as they climb
out of the depths of the valley, reach the warm,
level rays of sunlight that turns the first leaves
that have passed their prime into the fierce yellows
and biu*nt siennas which, when faithfully represented
at Burlington House, are often considered overdone.
Even the gaunt obelisk near Marske Hall responds
ABOVE SWALEDALE 66
to a fine sunset of this sort, and shows a gilded
side that gives it ahnost a touch of grandeiu*.
Evening is by no means necessary to the attrac-
tions of Swaledale, for a blazing noon gives lights
and shades and contrasts of colour that are a large
portion of Swaledale's charms. If instead of taking
either the old road by way of Marske, or the new
one by the riverside, one had crossed the old bridge
below the castle, and left Richmond by a very
steep road that goes to Leybum, one would have
reached a moorland that is at its best in the ftdl
light of a clear morning. The road goes through
the gray little village of Hudswell, which possesses
some half-destroyed cottages that give it a forlorn
and even pathetic character. As one goes on
towards the open plateau of Downholme Moor, a
sense of keen regret will force itself upon the mind ;
for here, in this gloriously healthy air, there are
cottages in excess of the demand, and away in the
great centres of laboiu*, where the atmosphere is
lifeless and smoke - begrimed, overcrowding is a
perpetual evil. Perhaps the good folks who might
have been dwelling in Hudswell, or some other
breezy village, prefer their surroundings in some
gloomy street in Sheffield ; perhaps those who lived
in these broken little homes died long ago, and
66 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
there are none who sigh for space and air after the
fashion of caged larks ; perhaps But we have
reached a gate now, and when we are through it
and out on the bare brown expanse, with the *wide
horizons beckoning ' on every side, the wind carries
away every gloomy thought, and leaves in its place
one vast optimism, which is, I suppose, the joy of
living, and one of God's best gifts to man.
The clouds are big, but they carry no threat of
rain, for right down to the far horizon from
whence this wind is coming there are patches of
blue proportionate to the vast spaces overhead. As
each white mass passes across the sun, we are
immersed in a shadow many acres in extent; but
the sunlight has scarcely fled when a rim of light
comes over the edge of the plain, just above the
hollow where Downholme village lies hidden from
sight, and in a few minutes that belt of sunshine
has reached some sheep not far off, and rinmied
their coats with a brilliant edge of white. Shafts
of whiteness, like searchlights, stream from behind
a distant cloud, and everywhere there is brilliant
contrast and a purity to the eye and lungs that
only a Yorkshire moor possesses.
Making oiu* way along a grassy track, we cross
the heather and bent, and go down an easy
DOWN HOLME MOOR. ABOVE SWALEDALE
" Wide horizons beckoning, far beyond the hill,
Greatness overhead,
The flock's contented tread
An' trample o' the morning wind adown the open
trail."
H. H. Bashford.
THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC Library!
ASTOR, LENOX AND
I TILDEN FOUNDATIONS
R
A FEUDAL HALL 67
slope towards the gray roofs of Downholme. The
situation is pretty, and there is a triangular green be-
yond the inn ; but, owing to the church being some
distance away, the village seems to lack in features.
A short two miles up the road to Leybum, just
above Gill Beck, there is an ancient house known
as Walbum Hall, and also the remains of the
chapel belonging to it, which dates from the Per-
pendicular period. The buildings are now used as
a feurm, but there are still enough suggestions of a
dignified past to revivify the times when this was
a centre of feudal power. Although the archi-
tecture is not Norman, there is a fragment in one
of the walls that seems to indicate an earlier house
belonging to the Walburns, for one of them —
Wjmier de Walbum — ^held a certain number of
oxgangs of land there in 1286.
Turning back to Swaledale by a lane on the
south side of Gill Beck, Downholme village is
passed a mile away on the right, and the bold
scenery of the dale once more becomes impressive.
The sunshine has entirely gone now, and, although
there are still some hours of daylight left, the
ponderous masses of blue-gray cloud that have
slowly spread themselves frx)m one horizon to the
other have caused a gloom to take the place of the
8
58 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
morning's dazzling sunshine. When we get lower
down, and have a glimpse of the Swale over the
hedge, a most imposing scene is suddenly visible.
We would have illustrated it here, but the Dale
Country is so prolific in its noble views that a
selection of twenty pictures must of pure necessity
do injustice to the many scenes it omits.
Two great headlands, formed by the wall-like
terminations of Cogden and Harkerside Moors,
rising one above the other, stand out magnificently.
Their huge sides tower up nearly a thousand feet
fix)m the river, until they are within reach of the
lowering clouds that every moment threaten to
envelop them in their indigo embrace. There
is a curious rift in the dark cumulus revealing
a thin line of dull carmine that frequently changes
its shape and becomes nearly obliterated, but its
presence in no way weakens the awesomeness of
the picture. The dale appears to become huger
and steeper as the clouds thicken, and what have
been merely woods and plantations in this heavy
gloom become mysterious forests. The river, too,
seems to change its character, and become a pale
serpent, uncoiling itself from some mountain fest-
ness where no living creatiures, besides great auks
and carrion birds, dwell.
* WHITE CLOTHID NUNNES' 69
In such surroundings as these there were estab-
lished in the Middle Ages two religious houses,
within a mile of one another, on opposite sides of
the swirling river. On the north bank, not far
from Marriek village, you may still see the ruins of
Marrick Priory in its beautifrd situation much as
Turner painted it a century ago. Leland describes
Marrick as *a Priory of Blake Nunnes of the
Foundation of the Askes.' It was, we know, an
establishment for Benedictine Nuns, founded or
endowed by Roger de Aske in the twelfth century.
At EUerton, on the other side of the river a little
lower down, the nunnery was of the Cistercian
Order ; for, although very little of its history has
been discovered, Leland writes of the house as * a
Priori of White clothid Nunnes.' After the Battle
of Bannockbum, when the Scots raided all over
the North Riding of Yorkshire, they came along
Swaledale in search of plunder, and we are told
that EUerton suffered from their violence. The
ruins that witnessed these scenes remain most
provokingly silent, and Heaven knows if they ever
echoed to the cries of the defenceless nuns or the
coarse laughter of the Scots, for the remains tell us
nothing at alL
Where the dale becomes wider, owing to the
8—2
60 YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
branch valley of Arkengarthdale, there are two
villages close together. Grinton is reached first,
and is older than Reeth, which is a short distance
north of the river. The parish of Grinton is one
of the largest in Yorkshire. It is more than twenty
miles long, containing something near 50,000 acres,
and according to Mr. Speight, who has written a
very detailed history of Richmondshire, more than
80,000 acres of this consist of mountain, grouse-
moor, and scar. For so huge a parish the church
is suitable in size, but in the upper portions of the
dales one must not expect any very remarkable
exteriors ; and Grinton, with its low roofs and plain
battlemented tower, is much like other churches in
the neighbourhood. Inside there are suggestions
of a Norman building that has passed away, and
the bowl of the font seems also to belong to that
period. The two chapels opening from the chancel
contain some interesting features, which include a
hagioscope, and both are enclosed by old screens.
Leaving the village behind, and crossing the
Swale, you soon come to Reeth, which may,
perhaps, be described as a little town. It must
have thrived with the lead-mines in Arkengarth-
dale and along the Swale, for it has gone back
since the period of its former prosperity, and is
IN UPPER SWALEDALE 61
glad of the fact that its splendid situation, and the
cheerful green which the houses look upon, have
made it something of a holiday resort, although
it still retains its grajmess and its simplicity, both
of which may be threatened if a red-roofed hotel
were to make its appearance, the bare thought of
which is an anxiety to those who appreciate the
soft colours of the locality.
When Reeth is left behind, there is no more of
the fine * new ' road which makes travelling so easy
for the eleven miles from Richmond. The surface
is, however, by no means rough along the nine
miles to Muker, although the scenery becomes far
wilder and more mountainous with every mile.
The dale narrows most perceptibly; the woods
become widely separated, and almost entirely dis-
appear on the southern side ; and the gaunt moors,
creeping down the sides of the valley, seem to
threaten the narrow belt of cultivation, that becomes
increasingly restricted to the river margins. Pre-
cipitous limestone scars fringe the browny-green
heights in many places, and almost girdle the
summit of Calver Hill, the great bare height that
rises a thousand feet above Reeth. The farms and
hamlets of these upper parts of Swaledale are of
the same grays, greens, and browns as the moors
62 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
and scars that surround them. The stone walls,
that are often high and forbidding, seem to
suggest the fortifications required for man's fight
with Nature, in which there is no encouragement
for the weak. In the splendid weather that so
often welcomes the mere summer rambler in the
upper dales the austerity of the widely scattered
fiums and villages may seem a little unaccountable ;
but a visit in January would quite remove this
impression, though even in these lofty parts of
England the worst winter snowstorm has, in quite
recent years, been of trifling inconvenience. Bad
winters will, no doubt, be experienced again on the
fells ; but leaving out of the account the snow that
used to bury farms, flocks, roads, and even the
smaller gills, in a vast smother of whiteness, there
are still the winds that go shrieking over the desolate
heights, there is still the high rainfall, and there
are still destructive thunderstorms that bring with
them hail of a size that we seldom encouinter in
the lower levels. Mr. Lockwood records a remark-
able storm near Sedbergh in which there were only
three flashes. The first left senseless on the grouind
two brothers who were tending sheep, the second
killed three cows that were sheltering under an
oak, and the third unroofed a large portion of a
FLOODS AND STORMS IN THE DALES 6S
bam and split up two trees. In this case the
ordinary conditions of thunderstorms would seem
to have been reversed, the electric discharge taking
place from the earth to the clouds; otherwise, it
is hard to accoimt for such destruction with each
flash.
The great rapidity with which the Swale, or such
streams as the Arkle, can produce a devastating
flood can scarcely be comprehended by those who
have hot seen the results of even moderate rain-
storms on the fells. When, however, some really
wet days have been experienced in the upper parts
of the dales, it seems a wonder that the bridges are
not more often in jeopardy. Long lines of pale-
gray clouds, with edges so soft that they almost
coalesce, come pressing each other on to the bare
heights, and, almost before one mass has trans-
formed itself into silvery streaks on the fellsides,
there are others pouring down on their emaciated
remains.
Of course, even the highest hills of Yorkshire
are surpassed in wetness by their Lakeland neigh-
bours ; for whereas Hawes Junction, which is only
about seven miles south of Muker, has an average
yearly rainfall of about 62 inches, Mickleden, in
Westmoreland, can show 187, and certain spots in
64 YORKSHmE BALES AND FELLS
Cumberland aspire towards 200 inches in a year.
No figures seem to exist for Swaledale, but in the
lower parts of Wensleydale the rainfall is only half
of what has been given for Hawes, which stands at
the head of that valley.
The weather conditions being so severe, it is not
surprising to find that no com at all is grown in
Swaledale at the present day. Some notes, found
in an old family Bible in Teesdale, are quoted by
Mr. Joseph Morris. They show the painM diffi-
culties experienced in the eighteenth century fix)m
such entries as : * 1782. I reaped oats for John
Hutchinson, when the field was covered with snow,'
and 2 * 1799, Nov. 10. Much com to cut and carry.
A hard fi-ost'
Muker, notwithstanding all these climatic difficul-
ties, has some claim to picturesqueness, despite the
fact that its church is better seen at a distance, for
a close inspection reveals its rather poverty-stricken
state. The square tower, so typical of the dales,
stands well above the weathered roofs of the village,
and there are sufficient trees to tone down the severi-
ties of the stone walls, that are inclined to make one
house much like its neighbour, and but for natural
surroimdings would reduce the hamlets to the same
uniformity. At Muker, however, there is a steep
MOUNTAIN SCENERY 66
bridge and a rushing mountain stream that joins the
Swale just below. The road keeps close to this beck,
and the houses are thus restricted to one side of
the way. There is a bright and cheerful appearance
about the Farmers' Arms, the small inn that stands
back a little from the road with a cobbled space in
front. Inside you may find a grandfather clock by
Pratt of Askrigg in Wensleydale, a portrait of Lord
Kitchener, and a good square meal of the ham and
^gs and tea order.
Away to the south, in the direction of the
Buttertubs Pass, is Stags Fell, 2,218 feet above the
sea, and something like 1,800 feet above Muker.
Northwards, and towering over the village, is the
isolated mass of Kisdon Hill, on two sides of which
the Swale, now a mountain stream, rushes and boils
among boulders and ledges of rock. This is one
of the finest portions of the dale, and, although the
road leaves the river and passes round the western
side of Kisdon, there is a path that goes through
the glen, and brings one to the road again at
Keld.
Just before you reach Keld, the Swale drops
80 feet at Kisdon Force, and after a night of rain
there are many other waterfalls to be seen in this
district These are not to me, however, the chief
9
66 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
attractions of the head of Swaledale, although with-
out the angry waters the gills and narrow ravines
that open from the dale would lose much interest.
It is the stem grandeur of the scarred hillsides and
the wide mountainous views from the heights that
give this part of Yorkshire such a fascination. If
you climb to the top of Rogan's Seat, you have a
huge panorama of desolate country spread out before
you. The confused jumble of blue-gray mountains
to the north-west is beyond the limits of Yorkshire
at last, and in their strong embrace those stem
Westmoreland hills hold the charms of Lakeland.
Down below is the hamlet of Keld, perched in an
almost Swiss fsushion on a sharply-falling hillside,
and among the surrounding masses of heaving moor
are the birthplaces of the dozen becks that supply
the headwaters of the Swale. These nearer hills,
which include High Seat and the Lady's Pillar,
form the watershed of this part of the Yorkshire
border ; for on the western slopes are to be found
the sources of the river Eden that flows through
the beautiful valley, which is one of the greatest
charms of the Midland route to Scotland.
If one stays in this mountainous region, there
are new and exciting walks available for every day.
There are gloomy recesses in the hillsides that
INACCESSIBLE SOUTUDES 67
encourage exploration from the knowledge that
they are not tripper-worn, and there are endless
heights to be climbed that are equally free from
the smallest traces of desecrating mankind. Rare
flowers, ferns, and mosses flourish in these inacces-
sible solitudes, and will continue to do so, on account
of the dangers that lurk in their fastnesses, and also
from the fact that their value is nothing to any but
those who are glad to leave them growing where
they are. You can look down into shadowy chasms
in the limestone, where underground waters fall
splashing with a hollow souind upon black shimmer-
ing rocks far below, or, stranger still, into subter-
ranean pools from which the waters overflow into
yet greater depths. You can follow the moimtain
streams through wooded ravines, and discover
cascades and waterfalls that do not appear in any
maps, and you may leave them by the rough tracks
that climb the hillsides when you, perchance, have
a longing for space and the sparkling clearness of
the moorland air.
9—2
WENSLEYDALE
CHAPTER IV
WENSLEYDALE
The approach from Muker to the upper part of
Wensleydale is by a mountain road that can
claim a grandeur which, to those who have never
explored the dales, might almost seem impossible.
I have called it a road, but it is, perhaps, question-
able whether this is not too high-sounding a term
for a track so invariably covered with large loose
stones and fiirrowed with water-courses. At its
highest point the road goes through the Butter-
tubs Pass, taking the traveller to the edge of the
pot-holes that have given their name to this
thrilling way through the mountain ridge dividing
the Swale from the Ure.
Such a lonely and dangerous road should no
doubt be avoided at night, but yet I am always
gratefid for the delays which made me so late that
darkness came on when I was at the highest
portion of the pass. It was late in September, and
71
7« YORKSfflHE DALES AND FELLS
it was the day of the feast at Hawes, which had
drawn to that small town fiurmers and their wives,
and most, if not all, the young men and maidens
within a considerable radius. I made my way
slowly up the long ascent from Muker, stumbling
frequently on the loose stones and in the water-
worn runnels that were scarcely visible in the dim
twilight. The huge, bare shoulders of the fells
began to close in more and more as I climbed.
Towards the west lay Great Shunnor Fell, its vast
brown-green mass being sharply defined against
the clear evening sky ; while further away to the
north-west there were blue mountains going to
sleep in the soft mistiness of the distance. Then
the road made a sudden zigzag, but went on
climbing more steeply than ever, until at last I
found that the stony track had brought me to the
verge of a precipice. There was not sufficient light
to see what dangers lay beneath me, but I could
hear the angry sound of a beck feilling upon
quantities of bare rocks. At the edge of the road
the ground curved away in an insidious manner
without any protecting bank, and I instinctively
drew towards the inner side of the way, fearing
lest a stumble among the stones that still covered
the road might precipitate me into the gorge
TWILIGHT IN THE BUTTER-TUBS PASS
The Butter-tubs are some deep pot-holes in the
limestone that lie just by the high stony road that
foes from Hawes in Wensleydale to Muker in
waledale.
f
PUBLIC L.BH A inY
ASTOB, ISNOX AND
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS
A DANGEROUS ROAD 78
below, where, even if one survived the fall, there
would be every opportunity of succumbing to one's
injuries before anyone came along the beck side.
The place is, indeed, so lonely that I can quite
believe it possible that a man might die there
and be reduced to a whitened skeleton before dis-
covery. Of course, one might be lucky enough to
be found by a shepherd, or some sheepdog might
possibly come after wanderers from a flock that
had found their way to this grim recess ; but then,
everyone is not equally on good terms with that
jade Fortune, and to such folk I offer this word of
caution. But here I have only commenced the
dangers of this pass, for if one does not keep to
the road, there is on the other side the still greater
menace of the Buttertubs, the dangers of which
are too well known to require any emphasis of
mine. Those pot-holes which have been explored
with much labour, and the use of winches and
tackle and a great deal of stout rope, have revealed
in their cavernous depths the bones of sheep that
disappeared from flocks which have long since
become mutton. This road is surely one that
would have afforded wonderftil illustrations to the
* Pilgrim's Progress,' for the track is steep and
narrow and painfully rough ; dangers lie on either
10
74 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
side, and safety can only be found by keeping in
the middle of the road.
What must have been the thoughts, I wonder,
of the dalesmen who on different occasions had to
go over the pass at night in those still recent times
when wraithes and hobs were terrible realities?
In the parts of Yorkshire where any records of the
apparitions that used to enliven the dark nights
have been kept, I find that these awesome
creatures were to be found on every moor, and
perhaps some day in my reading I shall dis-
cover an account of those that haunted this pass.
Perhaps a considerate Providence has kept me
from the knowledge of the form these spirits
assume in this particular spot, for the reason I
will recount. I had reached the portion of the
road where it goes so recklessly along the edge of
the precipitous scars, when, far away on the gloomy
fell-side ahead of me, there glimmered a strange
little light that disappeared for a moment and
then showed itself again. Soon afterwards it was
hidden, I supposed by some hoUow in the ground.
Had I been bred in the dales in the time of our
grandfathers, I should have fled wildly from such
a sight, and probably found an early grave in the
moist depths of one of the Buttertubs. As it was.
IN THE BUTTERTUBS PASS 76
although quite alone and without any means of
defence, I went on steadily, until at last, out of
the darkness, I heard a laugh that sounded
human enough, and then came to me the sound of
a heavy cart lumbering slowly over the stones.
The breeze wafted to me a suggestion of tobacco,
and in a moment my anxiety had gone. The cart
contained two girls, and by the horse's head walked
a man, while another followed on horseback. One
of the men lit his pipe again, and in the momentary
flare I could see his big, genial face, the farm-horse,
and the two happy maidens. We said 'Good-
night' to prove each other's honesty, and after a
while the sound of the cart died away, as it went
slowly along the windings of the pass. After this I
was seldom alone, for I had fallen in with the good
folks who had gone over to the feast at Hawes,
and were now homeward bound in the darkness.
Although there are probably few who care for
rough moorland roads at night, the Buttertubs
Pass in daylight is still a memorable place. The
pot-holes can then be safely approached, and one
can peer into the blackness below until the eyes
become adapted to the gloom. Then one sees the
wet walls of limestone and the curiously-formed
isolated pieces of rock that almost suggest columnar
10—2
76 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
basalt. In crevices far down delicate ferns are
growing in the darkness. They shiver as the cool
water drips upon them from above, and the drops
they throw off fall down lower still into a stream
of miderground water that has its beginnings no
man knows where. On a hot day it is cooling
simply to gaze into the Buttertubs, and the sowid
of the falling waters down in these shadowy places
is pleasant after gazing on the dry fell-sides.
Just beyond the head of the pass, where the
descent to Hawes begins, the shoulders of Great
Shunnor Fell drop down, so that not only straight
ahead, but also westwards, one can see a splendid
mountain view. Ingleborough's flat top is con-
spicuous in the south, and in every direction there
are indications of the geology of the fells. The
hard stratum of millstone grit that rests upon
the limestone gives many of the summits of the
hills their level character, and forms the sharply-
defined scars that encircle them. Lower down
the hills are generally rounded. It used to puzzle
Dr. Whitaker, the historian of these parts, * how,
upon a surface which must at first have consisted
of angles and right lines only, nothing but graceful
curves should now appear, as if some plastic hand
had formed the original surface over again for use
DENUDATION PROCESSES 77
and beauty at once.' Then, with the blankest
pessimism, he goes on to say that ^ these are among
the many questions relating to the theory of the
earth which the restless curiosity of man will ever
be asking without the hope or possibility of a solu-
tion ' I The exclamation mark is mine, for I cannot/
restrain my feelings of astonishment that a learned
man writing in 1805 should deny to us the know-
ledge we have of the action of ice and the other
forces of denudation, by which we are able to
understand to such a very great extent the agencies
that have produced the contours of the Yorkshire
mountains. The sudden changes of weather that
take place among these watersheds would almost
seem to be cause enough to explain the wearing
down of the angularities of the heights. Even
while we stand on the bridge at Hawes we can see
three or four ragged cloud edges letting down on
as many places torrential rains, while in between
there are intervals of blazing sunshine, under which
the green fells turn bright yellow and orange in
powerful contrast to the indigo shadows on every
side. *Such rapid changes from complete saturation
to sudden heat are trjdng to the hardest rocks, and
at Hardraw, close at hand, there is a still more
palpable process of denudation in^active operation.
78 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Such a morning as this is quite ideal for seeing
the remarkable waterfall known as Hardraw Scar
or Force. The footpath that leads up the glen
leaves the road at the side of the ^ Green Dragon '
at Hardraw, where the innkeeper hands us a key
to open the gate we must pass through. Being
September, and an uncertain day for weather, we
have the whole glen to ourselves, until behind
some rocks we discover a solitary angler. There is
nothing but the roughest of tracks to follow, for
the carefiiUy-made pathway that used to go right
up to the fall was swept away half a dozen years
ago, when the stream in a fierce mood cleared its
course of any traces of artificiality. We are deeply
grateful, and make our way among the big rocks
and across the slippery surfaces of shale, with
the roar of the waters becoming more and more
insistent. The sun has turned into the ravine a
great searchlight that has lit up the rock walls and
strewn the wet grass beneath with sparkling jewels.
On the opposite side there is a dense blue shadow
over everything except the foliage on the brow of
the clifis, where the strong autmnn colours leap
into a flaming glory that transforms the ravine
into an astonishing splendour. A little more
careful scrambling by the side of the stream, and
HARDRAW FORCE
This fall of water on a tributary of the Ure is
ffenerally considered to be the finest in Yorkshire.
The water comes over a lip of overhanging rock, and
drops dieer into a pool 80 feet below. It is a most
romantic spot at all times, but it is seen at its best
after a heavy rainfttlL It is possible to walk behind
the £all on a slippery spray-drenched path.
'PUBLIC LfcHARYj
JSTOK, iFMX AND
InLBENFOQNDATJONS
A REMAKKABLE WATERFALL 79
we see a white band of water falling from the over-
hanging limestone into the pool about ninety feet
below. Off the surface of the water drifts a mist
of spray, in which a soft patch of rainbow hovers
until the sun withdraws itself for a time and leaves
a sudden gloom in the horseshoe of overhanging
cliffs. The place is, perhaps, more in sympathy
with a cloudy sky, but, under sunshine or cloud,
the spout of water is a memorable sight, and its
imposing height places Hardraw among the small
group of England's finest waterfalls. Everyone,
however, realizes the disappointment so often ex-
perienced in visiting such sights in dry weather,
and the water at Hardraw sometimes shrinks to
a mere trickle, leaving only the rock chasm to tell
the traveller what can happen in really wet weather.
The beck that takes this prodigious leap rises on
Great Shunnor Fell, and if that mountain has
received the attentions of some low clouds during
the night, there is generally a gushing stream of
water pouring over the projecting lip of hard lime-
stone. The shale that lies beneath this stratum is
soft enough to be worked away by the water until
the limestone overhangs the pool to the extent of
ten or twelve feet, so that the water &lls sheer
into the circular basin, leaving a space between
80 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
the cliff and the fall where it is safe to walk on
a rather moist and slippery path that is constantly
being sprayed from the siir£eice of the pooL
In hard winters, such as that of 1881, the waters
freeze up into a great mass of ice, through which
the fall makes its way by keeping an open pipe
down the centre. It is recorded that in the winter
of 1789-40 the fall began to freeze at the top and
bottom, and that it eventually met, making 'one
hollow column which was seventy-two yards and
three-quarters in circumference.'
As we turn away from the roar of the waters
the sun comes through the clouds once more and
illuminates the glen with such a generous light
that we long to be in the open again, so that we
may see all the play of the sweeping shadows along
the slopes of Wensleydale. As we cross the Ure
we have a view of the wet roofs of Hawes shining
in dazzling light. The modem church-tower, with
a pinnacle at one comer only, stands out con-
spicuously, but the little town looks uninteresting,
although it does not spoil the views of the head
of the dale. The street is wide and long, and
would be very dull but for the splendid surround-
ings which the houses cannot quite shut out. As
we are here for pleasure, and not to make an
FOAMING CASCADES 81
examination of every place in the dale country,
we will hurry out of the town at once, making
our way southwards to the little hamlet of Gayle,
where old stone cottages are scattered on each
side of the Duerley Beck. Dodd Fell, where the
beck has its source, is mantled by a cloud that is
condensing into rain with such rapidity that, if
we wait on the bridge for a time, we shall be able
to see the already swollen waters rise still higher
as they come foaming over the broad cascades.
The stream has much the colour of ale, and the
creamy foam adds to the effect so much that one
might imagine that some big brew-house had
collapsed and added the contents of its vats to
the stream. But we have only to realize that, as
upper Wensleydale produces no com and no
hops, breweries could scarcely exist. When
Leland wrote, nearly four hundred years ago, he
said : * Uredale veri litle Come except Bygg oi
Otes, but plentiful of Gresse in Comimunes,' so
that, although this dale is so much more genial
in aspect, and so much wider than the valley of the
Swale, yet crops are under the same disabilities.
Leaving Gayle behind, we climb up a steep and
stony road above the beck until we are soon above
the level of green pasturage. The stone walls still
U
82 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
cover the hillsides with a net of very large mesh,
but the sheep find more bent than grass, and the
ground is often exceedingly steep. Higher still
climbs this venturesome road, until all around us
is a vast tumble of gaunt brown fells, divided by
ravines whose sides are scarred with runnels of water,
which have exposed the rocks and left miniature
screes down below. At a height of nearly 1,600
feet there is a gate, where we will turn away from
the road that goes on past Dodd Fell into Lang-
strothdale, and instead climb a smooth grass track
sprinkled with half-buried rocks until we have
reached the summit of Wether Fell, 400 feet
higher. There is a scanty growth of ling upon
the top of this height, but the hills that lie about
on every side are browny-green or of an ochre
colour, and there is little of the purple one sees
in the Cleveland Hills.
The cultivated level of Wensleydale is quite
hidden from view, so that we look over a vast
panorama of mountains extending in the west as
far as the blue fells of Lakeland. I have painted
the westward view from this very summit, so that
any written description is hardly needed ; but
behind us, as we £ace the scene illustrated here,
there is a wonderfttl expanse that includes the
A RUGGED VIEW ABOVE WENSLEYDALE
The picture shows the mountains to the north-west
of Wether Fell (2,0x5 f'^O* ^^ heathery summit of
which appears in the foreground. Hawes lies to the
right, hidden by the steep sides of the dale.
J '
THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LENOX AND
TILDEN FOUNDATIONS
A GREAT SNOWSTORM 88
heights of Addlebrough, Stake Fell, and Penhil
Beacon, which stand out boldly on the southern
side of Wensleydale. I have seen these hills lightly
covered with snow, but that can give scarcely the
smallest suggestion of the scene that was witnessed
after the remarkable snowstorm of January, 1895,
which blocked the roads between Wensleydale and
Swaledale until nearly the middle of March. Roads
were cut out, with walls of snow on either side
from 10 to 15 feet in height, but the wind and
fresh falls almost obliterated the passages soon after
they had been cut. In Langstrothdale Mr. Speight
tells of the extraordinary difficulties of the dales-
folk in the farms and cottages, who were faced
with starvation owing to the difficulty of getting
in provisions. They cut ways through the drifts
as high as themselves in the direction of the Ukeliest
places to obtain food, while in Swaledale they built
sledges. It is difficult to imagine such scenes after
a hot climb on a warm afternoon, even though
great white masses of cumulus are l3dng in serried
ridges near the horizon; but, having seen the
Lake District under a thick mantle of snow from
the top of Helvellyn, I have some idea of the scene
in Wensleydale after that stupendous falL
When we have left the highest part of Wether
11—2
84 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Fell, we find the track taking a perfectly straight
line between stone walls. The straightness is so
unusual that there can be little doubt that it is a
survival of one of the Roman ways connecting
their station on Brough Hill, just above the village
of Bainbridge, with some place to the south-west.
The track goes right over Cam Fell, and is known
as the Old Cam Road, but I cannot recommend it
for any but pedestrians. When we have descended
only a short distance, there is a sudden view of
Semmerwater, the only piece of water in Yorkshire
that really deserves to be called a lake. It is a
pleasant surprise to discover this placid patch of
blue lying among the hills, and partially hidden by
a fellside in such a way that its area might be far
greater than 105 acres. Those who know Turner's
painting of this lake would be disappointed, no
doubt, if they saw it first from this height. The
picture was made at the edge of the water with
the Carlow Stone in the foreground, and over the
mountains on the southern shore appears a sky
that would make the dullest potato-field thrilling.
A short distance lower down, by straying a little
from the road, we get a really imposing view of
Bardale, into which the ground faUs suddenly from
our very feet. Sheep scamper nimbly down their
THE LEGEND OF SEMMERWATER 86
convenient little tracks, but there are places where
water that overflows from the pools among the
bent and ling has made blue -gray seams and
wrinkles in the steep places that give no foothold
even to the toughest sheep. Raydale and Cragdale
also send down becks that join with Bardale Beck
just before they enter Semmerwater. Just now
the three glens are particularly imposing, for some
of the big clouds that have been sweeping across
the heavens all day are massing themselves on the
edges of the heights, and by eclipsing themselves
have assumed an angry indigo hue that makes the
scene almost Scottish.
Perhaps it is because Yorkshire folk are so unused
to the sight of lakes that both Semmerwater and
Gormire, near Thirsk, have similar legends con-
nected with their miraculous origin. Where the
water now covers the land, says the story, there
used to stand a small town, and to it there once
came an angel disguised as a poor and ill-clad
beggar. The old man slowly made his way along
the street from one house to another asking for
food, but at each door he met with the same blank
refusal. He went on, therefore, imtil he came to
a poor little cottage outside the town. Although
the couple who lived there were almost as old and
86 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELUS
as poor as himself, the beggar asked for something
to eat as he had done at the other houses. The old
folk at once asked him in, and, giving him bread,
milk, and cheese, urged him to pass the night under
their root Then in the morning, when the old man
was about to take his departure, came the awful
doom upon the inhospitable town, for the beggar
held up his hands, and said :
^ Semmerwater, rise ! Semerwater, sink !
And swallow the town, all save this house,
Where they gave me meat and drink/
Of course, the waters obeyed the disguised angel ;
and, for proof, have we not the existence of the
lake, and is there not also pointed out an ancient
little cottage standing alone at the lower end of
thekke?
We lose sight of Semimerwater behind the ridge
that forms one side of the branch dale in which it
lies, but in exchange we get beautiful views of the
sweeping contours of Wensleydale. High upon
the fiirther side of the valley Askrigg's gray roofe
and pretty church stand out against a steep fell-
side; further down we can see Nappa Hall, sur-
rounded by trees, just above the winding river, and
Bainbridge lies close at hand. We soon come to
the broad and cheerful green, surrounded by a
THE GREEN AT BAINBRID6E 87
picturesque scattering of old but well preserved
cottages ; for Balubridge has sufficient charms to
make it a pleasant inland resort for holiday times
that is quite ideal for those who are content to
abandon the sea. The overflow from Semmer-
water, which is called the Bain, fiUs the village
with its music as it falls over ledges of rock in
many cascades along one side of the green. There
is a steep bridge, which is conveniently placed
for watching the waterfalls ; there are white geese
always drilling on the grass, and there are still to
be seen the upright stones of the stocks. The
pretty inn called the * Rose and Crown,' overlooking
a comer of the green, states upon a board that it
was established in 1445. This date at one time
appeared in raised letters upon a stone over the
doorway, which, Mr. Speight tells us, ' had formerly
a good Norman arch.' Anything of that period
would, of course, cany the origin of the building
back some centuries earlier than the year claimed
for the establishment of the inn. The great age
of the village, owing to its existence in Roman
times, as well as the importance it gained through
being not only situated at important cross-roads,
but also on the edge of the forest of Wensleydale,
would account for the early establishment of some
88 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
sort of hostelry for the entertainment of travellers.
Even at the present day a horn-blowing custom
has been preserved at Bainbridge. It takes place
at ten o'clock every night between Holy Rood
(September 27) and Shrovetide, but somehow the
reason for the observance has been forgotten. The
medieval regulations as to the carrying of horns
by foresters and those who passed through forests
would undoubtedly associate the custom with early
times, and this happy old village certainly gains
our respect for having preserved anything from
such a remote period. When we reach Bolton
Castle we shall find in the museum there an old
horn from Bainbridge.
Besides having the length and breadth of Wens-
leydale to explore with or without the assistance
of the railway, Bainbridge has as its particular pos-
session the valley containing Semmerwater, with
the three romantic dales at its head. Counterside,
a hamlet perched a little above the lake, has an old
hall, where Gteorge Fox stayed in 1677 as a guest
of Richard Robinson. The inn bears the date 1667
and the initials * B. H. J.,' which may be those of
one of the Jacksons, who were Quakers at that
time.
On the other side of the river, and scarcely more
THE VASTNESS OF WENSLEYDALE 89
than a mile from Bainbridge, is the little town of
Askxigg, which supplies its neighbour with a
church and a railway-station. There is a charm
in its breezy situation that is ever present, for
even when we are in the narrow little street that
curves steeply up the hill there are peeps of the
dale that are quite exhilarating. The square-
topped Addlebrough is separated from us by
a great airy space, and looking up and down the
broad dale which widens eastwards and becomes
narrower and more rugged to the west, there
appears to be a vastness lying around us which
no plain can suggest. We can see Wether Fell,
with the road we traversed yesterday plainly
marked on the slopes, and down below, where the
Ure takes its way through bright pastures, there
is a mist of smoke ascending from Hawes. Block-
ing up the head of the dale are the spurs of Dodd
and Widdale Fells, while beyond them appears
the blue summit of Bow FelL We find it hard
to keep our eyes away from the distant mountains,
which fascinate one by appearing to have an im-
portance that is perhaps diminished when they are
close at hand. All the big clouds that yesterday
could scarcely hold up their showers for the
shortest intervals have disappeared; perhaps they
12
90 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELIS
have now reached the river in liquid form, and
are sparkling in the sunshine that now comes,
without interruption, from their spotless cenotaph.
We will follow SheUey's metaphor no further,
for there is water enough everywhere to fill the
dales with all the roarings and murmurings that
the forces and gills can supply, and we would
gladly forget the cloud's ' silent laugh ' as it burins
to unbuild the blue dome of heaven.
We find ourselves halting on a patch of grass
by the restored market-cross to look more closely
at a fine old house overlooking the three-sided
space. There is no doubt as to the date of the
building, for a plain inscription begins * Gulielmus
Thornton posuit banc domum MDCLXXVIII.'
The bay windows, as may be seen in the illustra-
tion, have heavy muUions and transoms, and there
is a dignity about the house which must have been
still more apparent when the surrounding houses
were lower than at present The wooden gallery
that is constructed between the bays was, it is
said, built as a convenient place for watching the
bull-fights that took place just below. In the
grass there can still be seen the stone to which
the bull-ring was secured. The churchyard runs
along the west side of the little market-place, so
A JACOBEAN HOUSE AT ASKRIGG
The village of Askrigg, perched picturesquely on
the northern slopes of Wensleydale, possesses this
imposing stone house. It overlooks the open space
by the church, where bull-fights took place in the
early part of last century. The ring is still to be seen
in the patch of grass, and the wooden balcony
between the projecting bays of the house was a
favourite position for watching the contests.
WENSLEYDALE KNITTING 91
that there is an open view on that side, made
interesting by the Perpendicular church. The
simple square tower and the unbroken roof-lines
are battlemented, like so many of the churches
of the dales; inside we find Norman pillars that
are quite in strange company, if it is true that they
were brought from the site of Fors ABbey, a
little to the west of the town. The greater part
of the church dates from 1466, and shortly after
this reconstruction of the thirteenth-century build-
ing a chantry in the south aisle, dedicated to St.
Anne, was founded by one of the Metcalfes of
Nappa Hall, which we shall pass on our way to
Aysgarth.
Wensleydale generally used to be famed for its
hand-knitting, but I think Askrigg must have
turned out more work than any place in the valley,
for the men as well as the womenfolk were equally
skilled in this employment, and Mr. Whaley says
they did their work in the open air * while gossip-
ing with their neighbours.' This statement is,
nevertheless, exceeded by what appears in a
volume entitled *The Costume of Yorkshire.*
In that work of 1814, which contains a nuniber
of G^eorge Walker's quaint drawings, reproduced
by Uthography, we find a picture having a strong
12—2
92 YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
suggestion of Askrigg in which there is a group
of old and young of both sexes seated on the steps
of the market-cross, all knitting, and a little way
off a shepherd is seen driving some ^eep through
a gate, and he also is knitting. The letterpress
describes how a woman named Slinger, who lived
in Cotterdale, used to walk to and from Hawes
Market with her goods on her head, knitting
steadily all the way. Kjiitting-machines have long
since killed this industry, but Askrigg has some-
how survived the loss. Grandfather-clocks are
still made in the little town, as they have been
for a great number of years. We have already
noticed an old Askrigg clock at Muker, and if
we keep our eyes open we shall come across others,
as well as examples fix>m Leybum, Middleham,
and other places in the dale that possessed a clock-
maker.
It is interesting to those who wish to get a
correct idea of a place before visiting it to know
that they may easily be led astray by even the
best guides. When we read in Murray that
Askrigg is a * dull little town of gray houses,' we
are at once predisposed against the place, although
we might know that all the houses in the dales are
gray. No suggestion is given of the splendid situa-
ASKRIGG V. HA WES 98
tion, and one might imagine that all the houses,
with the exception of the one near the church,
are featureless and quite uninteresting. This, of
course, would be a total misapprehension, for
many of the buildings are old, with quaint door-
ways and steps, and there are mossy roofs that
add colour to the stone, which is often splashed
with orange and pale emerald lichen. In writing
of Hawes, on the other hand, Murray omits to
mention the lack of picturesqueness in its really
dull street, merely sajdng that * the town itself is
growing and improving.' Not content, however,
with this approval of the place, the guide goes
still further astray by stating that the dale in the
neighbourhood of Hawes ^ is broad and open, and
not very picturesque 'I I cannot help exclaiming
at such a statement, although I may be told that
all this is a mere matter of individual opinion, for
is not Wensleydale broad and open from end to
end, and is not Hawes situated in the midst of
some of the wildest and noblest fells in Yorkshire ?
It is true that the town lies on the level ground
by the river, and thus the views from it do not
form themselves into such natural pictures as they
do at Askrigg, but I am inclined to blame the
town rather than the scenery.
94 YORESHIBE DALES AND FELLS
From Askrigg there is a road that climbs up
from the end of the little street at a gradient that
looks like 1 in 4, but it is really less formidable.
Considering its steepness the surface is quite good,
but that is due to the industry of a certain road-
mender with whom I once had the privilege to
talk when, hot and breathless, I paused to enjoy
the great expanse that lay to the south. He was
a fine Saxon type, with a sunburnt face and equally
brown arms. Road-making had been his ideal
when he was a mere boy, and since he had obtained
his desire he told me that he couldn't be happier if
he were the King of England. And his content-
ment seemed to me to be based largely upon his
intense pleasure in bringing the roads to as great
a perfection as his careful and thinking labour
could compass. He did not approve of steam-
rollers, for his experience had taught him that if
the stones were broken small enough they bound
together quickly enough. Besides this, he dis-
approved of a great camber or curve on the road
which induces the traffic to keep in the middle,
leaving a mass of loose stones on either side. The
result of his work may be seen on the highway
from Askrigg to Bainbridge, where a conspicuous
smoothness has come to a road that was recently
MILL GILL FORCE 96
one of the most indifferent in the district. Perhaps
he may eventually be given the maintenance of
the way over the Buttertubs Pass; and if he
ever induces that road to become a little more
civilized, this enthusiastic workman will gain the
appreciation of the whole neighbourhood. The
road where we leave him, breaking every large
stone he can find, goes on across a belt of brown
moor, and then drops down between gaunt scars
that only just leave space for the winding track to
pass through. It afterwards descends rapidly by
the side of a gill, and thus enters Swaledale.
There is a beautiful walk from Askrigg to Mill
Gill Force. The distance is scarcely more than
half a mile across sloping pastures and through
the curious stiles that appear in the stone walls.
So dense is the growth of trees in the little ravine
that one hears the sound of the waters close at
hand without seeing anything but the profusion of
foliage overhanging and growing among the rocks.
After climbing down among the moist ferns and
moss-grown stones, the gushing cascades appear
suddenly set in a frame of such lavish beauty that
they hold a high place among their rivals in the
dale, and the particular charms of this spot are
hardly surpassed by any others in the whole
96 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
county. Higher up there is Whitfield Force,
which has a fall of nearly 50 feet. Its setting, too,
among great rock walls and an ancient forest
growth, is most fascinating, especially when one
finds that very few go beyond the greater falls
below.
Keeping to the north side of the river, we come
to Nappa Hall at a distance of a little over a mile
to the east of Askrigg. It is now a farmhouse,
but its two battlemented towers proclaim its
former importance as the chief seat of the family
of MetcaLFe. The date of the house is about 1459,
and the walls of the western tower are 4 feet in
thickness. The Nappa lands came to James
Metcalfe firom Sir Richard Scrope of Bolton
Castle shortly after his return to England from
the field of Agincourt, and it was probably this
James Metcalfe who built the existing house. We
are told something about the matter by Leland,
who says : * Knappey in Yorksldre^ now the chifest
House of the Metecalfes^ was boute by one Thomas
Metcalfe^ Siume to James Metecalfe^ of one of the
Lordes Scropes of Bolton.^ He also says that ^ on
it was but a Cotage or litle better House, ontille
this Thomas began ther to build, in the which
Building 2 Toures be very fair, beside other Log-
^ ^^^ ^ N APPA HALL 97
ginges.' Mr. Speight thinks that Leland made
some mistake as to the Metcalfe who purchased
the estate, and also as to the builder of the house ;
and in his account of Nappa the author of
* Romantic Richmondshire ' has, with the aid of the
Metcalfe Records, been able to correct several in-
accuracies which have been written about this
distinguished and numerous family.
Until the year 1880 there was still kept at
Nappa Hall a fine old four-post bedstead, which
was, according to tradition, the one slept in by Mary
^ Queen of Scots when she is said to have stayed in
2^ the house. Nothing exists, however, to give the
\D slightest colour to this story, but the bed, now
somewhat altered, is still in existence at Newby
Hall, near Ripon.
The road down the dale passes Woodhall Park,
and then, after going down close to the Ure, it bears
away again to the little village of Carperby. It
has a triangular green surrounded by white posts.
At the east end stands an old cross, dated 1674,
and the ends of the arms are ornamented with
grotesque carved heads. The cottages have a neat
and pleasant appearance, and there is much less
austerity about the place than one sees hi^
the dale. A branch road leads down to
98 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Station, and just where the lane takes a sharp bend
to the right a footpath goes across a smooth
meadow to the banks of the Ure. The rainfall of
the last few days, which showed itself at Mill Gill
Force, at Hardraw Scar, and a dozen other falls,
has been sufficient to swell the main stream at
Wensleydale into a considerable flood, and behind
the bushes that grow thickly along the river-side
we can hear the steady roar of the cascades of
Aysgarth. The waters have worn down the rocky
bottom to such an extent that in order to stand in
full view of the splendid fall we must make for a
gap in the foliage, and scramble down some natural
steps in the wall of rock forming low cliffs along
each side of the flood. Although it is still
September, the rocks are overhung with the most
brilliant autumn foliage. The morning simlight
coming across a dark plantation of firs on the
southern bank lights up the yellow and red leaves,
and turns the foaming waters into a brilliant white
where they are not under the shadow of the trees.
The water comes over three terraces of solid stone,
and then sweeps across wide ledges in a tempestuous
sea of waves and froth, until there come other
descents which alter the course of parts of the stream,
so that as we look across the riotous flood we can
AYSGARTH FORCE
The beautiftil river Ure that flows through Wensley-
dale falls over a series of x)cky ledges dose to the
village of Aysgarth. The picture shows the lower
series of falls on the momiig following a wet night
THE KEW TOM
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LENOX AND
TILDEN FOCITDATIONS
B L
AYSGARTH FORCE 99
see the waters flowing in many opposite directions.
Lines of cream-coloured foam spread out into
chains of bubbles which join together, and then,
becoming detached, again float across the smooth
portions of each low terrace. Where the water is
smooth and shaded by the overhanging mass of
trees it assumes a dark gre^i-brown colour, and
shows up the chains and necklaces of sportive
bubbles which the ctecades produce. I suppose
it was because Leland did not see the other great
falls in Wensleydale that he omits any mention of
High Force on the Tees and Hardraw Scar, but
yet mentions 'where Ure Ryver fauUethe very
depe betwixt 2 scarry Rokks.'
Besides these lower falls, we can see, if we go
up the course of the river towards Aysgarth, a
single cascade called the Middle Force, and from
the bridge which spans the river with one great
arch we have a convenient place to watch the
highest series of falls. But neither of these have
half the grandeur of the lowest of the series which
is illustrated here. There is a large mill by the
bridge, and, ascending the steep roadway that goes
up to the village, we soon reach the pathway to
the church. Perhaps because Aysgarth Force is
famous enough to attract large crowds of sightseers
18—2
281769B
100 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
on certain days throughout the summer, the church
is kept locked, and as we wish to see the splendid
Perpendicular screen, saved from the wreck of
Jervaulx Abbey, we must make our way to the
Vicarage, and enter the church in the company of
a custodian who watches us with suspicious eyes,
fearing, no doubt, that if he looks away or waits
in the churchyard we may feel anxious to leave
our initials on the reading-desk. Apart from the
screen, the choir stalls, and the other woodwork of
the dioir, there is very little interest in the church
owing to the rebuilding that has taken place, and
left few traces of antiquity beyond suggestions
of Early English work in the tower. There
is a short-cut by some footpaths that brings us to
Aysgarth village, which seems altogether to dis-
r^ard the church, for it is separated from it by
a distance of nearly half a mile. There is one
pleasant little street of old stone houses irregularly
disposed, many of them being quite picturesque,
with mossy roofs and ancient chinmeys. This
village, like Askrigg and Bainbridge, is ideally
situated as a centre for exploring a very consider-
able district. There is quite a network of roads to
the south, connecting the villages of Thoralby and
West Burton with Bishop Dale, and the main road
EVENING IN BISHOP DALE 101
through Wensleydale. Thoralby is very old, and
is beautifiilly situated under a steep hiUside. It
has a green overlooked by little gray cottages,
and lower down there is a tall miU with curious
windows built upon Bishop Dale Beck. Close to
this mill there nestles a long, low house of that
dignified type to be seen frequently in the North
Riding, as weU as in the villages of Westmoreland.
The huge chinmey, occupying a large proportion
of one gable-end, is suggestive of much cosiness
within, and its many shoulders, by which it tapers
towards the top, make it an interesting feature of
the house. The lower part of Bishop Dale is often
singularly beautiful in the evening. If we stop
and lean over a gate, we can see Stake Fell tower-
ing above us — an indistinct blue wall with a
sharply-broken edge. Above appears a pale-yellow
sky, streaked with orange-coloured clouds so thin
as to look almost like smoke. The intense silence
is broken by the buzz of a swift-flying insect, and
then when that has gone other sounds seem to
intensify the stillness. Suddenly a shriU beUow
from a cow echoes through the valley, a sheep-dog
barks, and we can hear the distant cough of cattle,
which are quite invisible in the gathering twilight.
A farmer in his cart drives slowly by up the steep
102 YORESHIBE DALES AND FELLS
lane, and then the silence becomes more complete
than before, and the fells become blue-black agamst
a sky which is just beginning to be spangled with
the palest of stars. They seem to flicker so much
that the soft evening breeze threatens to blow
them out altogether.
The dale narrows up at its highest point, but the
road is enclosed between gray walls the whole of
the way over the head of the valley. A wide view
of Langstrothdale and upper Wharfedale is visible
when the road begins to drop downwards, and to
the east Buckden Pike towers up to his imposing
height of 2,802 feet. We shall see him again when
we make our way through Wharfedale, but we
could go back to Wensleydale by a mountain-path
that climbs up the side of Cam Gill Beck from
Starbottom, and then, crossing the ridge between
Buckden Pike and Tor Mere Top, it goes down
into the wild recesses of Waldendale. So remote
is this valley that wild animals, long extinct in
other parts of the dales, survived there until almost
recent times.
When we have crossed the Ure again, and taken
a last look at the Upper Fall from Aysgarth Bridge,
we betake ourselves by a footpath to the main
highway through Wensleydale, turning aside before
A LETTER FROM MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS 108
reaching Redmire in order to see the great castle
of the Scropes at Bolton. It is a vast quadrangular
mass, with each side nearly as gaunt and as lofty
as the others. At each comer rises a great square
tower, pierced, with a few exceptions, by the smallest
of windows. Only the base of the tower at the
north-east comer remains to-day, the upper part
having fallen one stormy night in November, 1761,
possibly having been weakened during the siege of
the castle in the Civil War. We go into the court-
yard through a vaulted archway on the eastern side.
Many of the rooms on the side facing us are in good
preservation, and an apartment in the south-west
tower, which has a fireplace, is pointed out as having
been used by Mary Queen of Scots when she was
imprisoned here after the Battle of Langside in 1568.
It was the ninth Lord Scrope who had the custody
of the Queen, and he was assisted by Sir Francis
KnoUys. Mary, no doubt, found the time of her
imprisonment irksome enough, despite the magnifi-
cent views over the dale which her windows appear
to have commanded ; but the monotony was relieved
to some extent by the lessons in English which she
received from Sir Francis, whom she describes as
*her good schoolmaster.' While still a prisoner,
Mary addressed to him her first English letter.
104 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
which begins: *Mester Kiioleis, I heve sum neus
from Scotland'; and half-way through she begs
that he will excuse her writing, seeing that she had
*neuur vsed it afor/ and was ^hestet* The letter
concludes with 'thus, affter my commendations, I
prey God heuu you in his kipin. Your assured
gud £rind, Mari£ R.' Then comes a postscript:
*Excus my iuel writin thes fiirst tjon' — 'iuel'
being no doubt intended for * evil,'
Another relic of the Queen's captivity at Bolton
was a pane of glass, upon which she had scratched
* Marie R.' with a diamond ring; but it was
damaged during the execution of some repairs to
the castle, and in removing the glass for greater
security from the castle to Bolton Hall it was
hopelessly smashed.
The stories of Mary's attempts at escape have
long been considered mere fabrications, for, despite
many intimate details of the months spent at
Bolton, no reference to such matters have been
discovered. In the face of this denial on the part
of recorded history, Leybum Shawl still holds
affectionately to the story that Mary Stuart did
leave the castle unobserved, and that she was
overtaken there in the place called the Queen's
Gap.
. /
BOLTON CASTLE, WENSLEYDALE
In this feudal stronghold Mary Queen of Scots was
imprisoned for six months in 1568. She was brought
from Carlisle by Lord Scrope, the owner of Bolton
Castle. The building forms a gaunt square, lofty
and almost featureless, except for the broken towers
which rise at each of the four corners. Lord
Chancellor Scrope built the castle in the reign of
Richard II., and his descendants occupied it for three
centuries.
w^nnrTMa
PUBLIC LiBRART
ASTOa, LEN«l
TILDEN FOUnUMBI
B 4
AN INVASION SCARE 105
As we leave the grim castle, so fall of memories
of a great family and of a lovely Queen, we turn
back before it is hidden from our gaze, and see the
towers silhouetted against a golden sky much as it
is depicted in these pages. We think of all the
Scropes who have come and gone since that Lord
Richard received license in 1879 to crenellate the
fortress he had built, and we regret again the dis-
appearance of all those sumptuous tombs that once
adorned the choir of Easby Abbey. However,
there are memorials to members of the family in
Wensley Church lying a little to the east beyond
the wooded park of Bolton Hall, and we shall
arrive there before long if we keep to the right
at the turning beneath the height knoWn as
Scarth Nick. On the opposite side of the dale
Penhill Beacon stands out prominently, with its
flat summit reflecting just enough of the setting
sun to recall a momentous occasion when from that
commanding spot a real beacon-fire sent up a great
mass of flame and sparks. It was during the time
of Napoleon's threatened invasion of England, and
the lighting of this beacon was to be the signal to
the volunteers of Wensleydale to muster and march
to their rendezvous. The watchman on Penhill,
as he sat by the piled-up brushwood, wondering,
14
106 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
no doubt, what would happen to him if the dreaded
invasion were really to come about, saw, far away
across the Vale of Mowbray, a %ht which he at
once took to be the beacon upon Roseberry Topping.
A moment later tongues of flame and smoke were
pouring firom his own hilltop, and the news spread
up the dale like wildfire. The volunteers armed
themselves rapidly, and with drums beating they
marched away, with only such delay as was caused
by the hurried leave-takings with wives and mothers,
and aU the rest who crowded round. The con-
tingent took the road to Thirsk, and on the way
were joined by the Mashamshire men. Whether
it was with relief or disappointment I do not know;
but when the volunteers reached Thirsk they heard
that they had been called out by a false alarm, for
the light seen in the direction of Roseberry Topping
had been caused by accident, and the beacon on
that height had not been lit After all, the scare
did no harm, for it showed the mettle of the
Dalesmen, and they were afterwards thanked by
Parliament for their prompt response to the
signal
On the side of PenhiU that looks full towards
Bolton Castle there still remain the foundations of
the chapel of the Knight Templars, who must have
WENSLEY VILLAGE 107
established their hospital there soon after 1146,
when the Order was instituted in England.
Wensley stands just at the point where the dale,
to which it has given its name, becomes so wide
that it begins to lose its distinctive character. The
village is most picturesque and secluded, and it is
small enough to cause some wonder as to its dis-
tinction in naming the valley. It is suggested that
the name is derived from Wodenslag^ and that in
the time of the Northmen's occupation of these
parts the place named alter their chief god would
be the most important.- In its possession of a
pleasant sloping green, dominated by a great elm,
round whose base has been built a circub r platform,
Wensley is particularly happy. The Ure, flowing
close at hand, is crossed by a fine old bridge, whose
pointed arches must have survived many centuries ;
for Leland says that it was built by ^ Alwine^
Parson of JVencelaWj *200 Yer ago and more,'
that statement being made about the year 1588.
In the little church standing on the south side
of the green there is so much to interest us that
we are almost unable to decide what to examine
first, until, realizing that we are brought face to
face with a beautiful relic of Easby Abbey, we
tmn our attention to the parclose screen. It sur-
14—2
108 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
rounds the family pew of Bolton Hall, and on
three sides we see the Perpendicular woodwork
fitted into the east end of the north aisle. The
side that fronts the nave has an entirely different
appearance, being painted and of a classic order, very
lacking in any ecclesiastical flavour, an impression
not lost on those who, with every excuse, called it
* the opera box/ In the panels of the early part
of the screen are carved inscriptions and arms of
the Scropes covering a long period, and, though
many words and letters are missing, it is possible
to make them more complete with the help of the
record made by the heralds in 1665.
On the floor of the chancel is the brass to Sir
Simon de Wenselawe, a priest of the fourteenth
century. There is no trace of any inscription, and
the name was only discovered by a reference to the
brass in the will of Oswald Dykes, a rector who
died in Jacobean times, and desired that he might
be buried under the stone which now bears his
name above the figure of the priest. This brass
is the best in the North Riding, and it closely
resembles the one to Abbot de la Mare in St. Albans
Abbey.
A charming lane, overhung by big trees, runs
above the river-banks for nearly two mUes of the
EDWARD IV. A PRISONER AT MIDDLEHAM 109
way to Middleham; then it joins the road from
Leyburn, and crosses the Ure by a suspension
bridge, defended by two very formidable though
modem archways. Climbing up past the church,
we enter the cobbled market-place, which wears a
rather decayed appearance in sympathy with the
departed magnificence of the great castle of the
Nevilles. It commands a vast view of Wensley-
dale from the southern side, in much the same
manner as Bolton does from the north; but the
castle buildings are entirely different, for Middle-
ham consists of a square Norman keep, very massive
and lofty, surroimded at a short distance by a
strong wall and other buildings, also of consider-
able height, built in the Decorated period, when
the Nevilles were in possession of the stronghold.
The Norman keep dates from the year 1190, when
Robert Fitz Randolph, grandson of Ribald, a
brother of the Earl of Richmond, began to build
the Castle. It was, however, in later times, when
Middleham had come to the Nevilles by marriage,
that really notable events took place in this fortress.
It was here that Warwick, the * King-maker,' held
Edward IV. prisoner in 1467, and in Part III. of
the play of 'King Henry VI.,' Scene V. of the
fourth act is laid in a park near Middleham Castle.
110 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Richard III.'s only son, Edward Prince of Wales,
was bom here in 1476, the property having come
into Richard's possession by his marriage with
Anne Neville. The tower in which the boy was
bom is pointed out to-day, but how the knowledge
has been preserved I am quite unable to say.
When he was only eight years old, this little
Prince died in the castle in which he had first seen
the light
The efforts to blow up the projecting towers of
the Norman portion of the castle are most plainly
visible, but the splendid masonry, like that of Corfe,
in the Isle of Purbeck, has held together, although
great gaps have been torn out below, so that one
can scarcely imderstand why the upper part has
not coUapsed. The church contains some interesting
details, but they are not very apparent to the unin-
formed, to whom the building might appear some-
what duU. All can, however, be interested in the
old cross in the market-place, and also in the Swine
Cross in the upper market, which shows the battered
shape of some animal, carved either in the form of
the boar of Richard III. or the bear of Warwick.
We have already seen Leybum Shawl from near
Wensley, but its charm can only be appreciated by
seeing the view up the dale from its larch-crowned
THE VIEW UP WENSLEYDALE FROM
LEYBURN SHAWL
This is ooe of the spots in this beaatifal dale that
rtpays a visit a thousandfold. The effects are best on
a dear day, when sunlight and shadows are chasing
one another over the hills and woodlands.
THE NEW TORE
PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LENOX AND
TILDEN F0U)iDATl0M3
B L
THE VIEW FROM LEYBURN SHAWL 111
termination. Perhaps if we had seen nothing of
Wensleydale, and the wonderful views it offers, we
should he more inclined to regard this somewhat
popular spot with greater veneration; but after
having explored both sides of the dale, and seen
many views of a very similar character, we cannot
help thinking that the vista is somewhat over-
rated. Leybum itself is a cheerful little town,
with a modem church and a very wide main street
which forms a most extensive market-place. There
is a bull-ring stiU visible in the great open space,
but beyond this and the view from the Shawl
Leybum has few attractions, except its position as
a centre or a starting-place from which to explore
the romantic neighbourhood.
As we leave Leybum we get a most beautiful
view up Coverdale, with the two Whemsides
standing out most conspicuously at the head of the
vaUey, and it is this last view of Coverdale, and the
great vaUey from which it branches, that remains
in the mind as one of the finest pictures of this most
remarkable portion of Yorkshire.
RIPON AND FOUNTAINS ABBEY
15
CHAPTER V
RIPON AND FOUNTAINS ABBEY
We have come out of Wensleydale past the ruins
of the great Cistercian abbey of Jervaulx, which
Conan, Earl of Richmond, moved from Askrigg to
a kindlier climate, and we have passed through the
quiet little town of Masham, famous for its fair in
September, when sometimes as many as 70,000
sheep, including great numbers of the fine Wensley-
dale breed, are sold, and now we are at Ripon.
It is the largest town we have seen since we lost
sight of Richmond in the wooded recesses of Swale-
dale, and though we are still close to the Ure, we
are on the very edge of the dale country, and miss
the feUs that lie a httle to the west. The evening
has settled down to steady rain, and the market-
place is running with water that reflects the lights
in the shop-windows and the dark outline of the
obelisk in the centre. This erection is suspiciously
called ' the Cross,' and it made its appearance nearly
116 15 — 2
116 YORKSfflRE DALES AND FELLS
seventy years before the one at RichmoncL Gent
says it cost £564 lis. 9d., and that it is ' one of the
finest in England.' I could, no doubt, with the
smallest trouble discover a description of the real
cross it supplanted, but if it were anything half as
fine as the one at Richmond, I should merely be
moved to say harsh things of John Aislabie, who was
Mayor in 1702, when the obelisk was erected, and
therefore I will leave the matter to others. It is,
perhaps, an un-Christian occupation to go about the
country quarrelling with the deeds of recent genera-
tions, though I am always grateful for any traces
of the centuries that have gone which have been
allowed to survive. With this thought still before
me, I am startled by a long-drawn-out blast on a
horn, and, looking out of my window, which com-
mands the whole of the market-place, I can see
beneath the light of a lamp an old-fashioned figure
wearing a three-cornered hat. When the last
quavering note has come from the great circular
horn, the man walks slowly across the wet cobble-
stones to the obelisk, where I watch him wind
another blast just like the first, and then another,
and then a third, immediately after which he walks
briskly away and disappears down a turning. In
the light of morning I discover that the horn was
THE HORN-BLOWER OF RIPON 117
blown in front of the Town Hall, whose stucco
front bears the inscription: * Except ye Lord
keep ye cittie, ye Wakeman waketh in vain.' The
antique spelling is, of course, unable to give a
wrong impression as to the age of the building, for
it shows its period so plainly that one scarcely
needs to be told that it was built in 1801, although
it could not so easily be attributed to the notorious
Wyatt There are still a few quaint houses to be
seen in Ripon, and there clings to the streets a
certain flavour of antiquity. It is the minster,
nevertheless, that raises the *city' above the
average Yorkshire town. The west front, with
its twin towers, is to some extent the most
memorable portion of the great church. It is the
work of Archbishop Walter Gray, and is a most
beautiful example of the pure Early English style.
Inside there is a good deal of transitional Norman
work to be seen. The central tower was built in
this period, but now presents a most remarkable
appearance, owing to its partial reconstruction in
Perpendicular times, the arch that fisices the nave
having the southern pier higher than the Norman
one, and in the later style, so that the arch is lop-
sided. As a building in which to study the growth
of Elnglish Gothic architecture, I can scarcely think
118 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FRTT.S
it possible to find anything better, all the periods
being very clearly represented. The choir has
much sumptuous carved woodwork, and the
misereres are full of quaint detaiL In the library
there is a collection of very early printed books
and other relics of the minster that add very
greatly to the interest of the place.
The monument to Hugh Ripley, who was the last
Wakeman of Ripon and first Mayor in 1604, is on
the north side of the nave fiicing the entrance to the
crypt, popularly called * St Wilfiid's Needle/ A
rather difficult flight of steps goes down to a narrow
passage leading into a cylindrically vaulted cell
with niches in the walls. At the north-east comer
is the curious slit or ' Needle ' that has been thought
to have been used for purposes of trial by ordeal,
the innocent person being able to squeeze through
the narrow opening. In reality it is probably
nothing more than an arrangement for lighting
two ceUs with one lamp. The crypt is of such
a plainly Roman type, and is so similar to the one
at Hexham, that it is generally accepted as dating
fix)m the early days of Christianity in Yorkshire,
and there can be little doubt that it is a relic of
Wilfrid's church in those early times.
At a very convenient distance from Ripon, and
RIPON MINSTER FROM THE SOUTH
In its outline Ripon suggests Westminster, although
the west front with its twin towers is Eariy English
and not classic. Underneath the present building
is the Saxon crypt of Wilfrid's church, dating from
the seventh century.
THE GLADES OF STUDLEY ROYAL 119
approached by a pleasant lane, are the lovely
glades of Studley Royal, the noble park containing
the ruins of Fountains Abbey. The surroundings
of the great Cistercian monastery are so magni-
ficent, and the roofless church is so impressively
solemn, that, although the place is visited by many
thousands every year, yet, if you choose a day
when the weather or some other circumstances
keep other people away, you might easily imagine
that you were visiting the park and ruins as a
special privilege, and not as one of the public who,
through Lord Bipon's kindness, are allowed to
come and go with very few restrictions beyond
the pa3rment of a shilling.
Just after leaving the lodge there appears on
the right a most seductive glade, overhung by
some of the remarkable trees that give the park
its great fascination. The grassy slopes disappear
in shadowy green recesses in the foliage, in much
the fashion of the forest scenes depicted in tapes-
tries. It is just such a background as the Eliza-
bethans would have loved to fill with the mytho-
logical beings that figured so largely in their polite
conversation. Down below the beautifiilly-kept
pathway runs the Skell, but so transformed fix)m
its early character that you would imagine the
/
J
1«0 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
crescent-shaped lakes and the strip of smooth
water were in no way connected with the moun-
tain-stream that comes off Dallowgill Moor. It
is particularly charming that the peeps of the
water, bordered by smooth turf that occupies the
bottom of the steep and narrow valley, are only
had at intervals through a great hedge of clipped
yew. The paths wind round the densely-wooded
slopes, and give a dozen different views of each
mass of trees, each temple, and each bend of the
river. At last, from a considerable height, you
have the lovely view of the abbey ruins illustrated
here. At every season its charm is unmistakable,
and even if no stately tower and no roofless arches
fiUed the centre of the prospect, the scene would
be almost as memorable. It is only one of the
many pictures in the park that a retentive memory
will hold as some of the most remarkable in England.
Among the ruins the turf is kept in perfect
order, and it is pleasant merely to look upon the
contrast of the green carpet that is so evenly laid
between the dark stonework. The late-Norman
nave, with its solemn double line of round columns,
the extremely graceful arches of the Chapel of the
Nine Altars, and the magnificent vaulted per-
spective of the dark cellarium of the lay-brothers.
FOUNTAINS ABBEY 181
are perhaps the most fascinating portions of the
buildings. I might be well compared with the
last abbot but one, William Thirsk, who resigned
his post, foreseeing the coming Dissolution, and
was therefore called 'a varra fole and a misereble
ideote,' if I attempted in the short space available
to give any detailed account of the abbey or its
wonderful past 1 have perhaps said enough to
insist on its charms, and I know that all who
endorse my statements will, after seeing Fountains,
read with delight the books that are devoted to
its story.
16
KNARESBOROUGH AND HARROGATE
1ft— 2
CHAPTER VI
KNARESBOROUGH AND HARROGATE
It is sometimes said that Ejiaresborough is an
overrated town from the point of view of its
attractiveness to visitors, but this depends very
much upon what we hope to find there. If we
expect to find lasting pleasure in contemplating
the Dropping Well, or the pathetic little exhibi-
tion of petrified objects in the Mother Shipton
Inn, we may be prepared for disappointment. It
seems strange that the real and lasting charms of
the town should be overshadowed by such popular
and much-advertised < sights.' The first view of
the town from the 'high' bridge is so full of
romance that if there were nothing else to in-
terest us in the place we would scarcely be dis-
appointed. The Nidd, flowing smoothly at the
foot of the precipitous heights upon which the
church and the old roofs appear, is spanned by a
great stone viaduct. This mighty have been so
1S5
126 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FFJJfi
great a blot upon the scene that Ejiaresborough
would have lost half its charm. Strangely enough,
we find just the reverse is the case, for this rail-
way bridge, with its battlemented parapets and
massive piers, is now so weathered that it has
melted into its surroundings as though it had
come into existence as long ago as the oldest
building visible. The old Ejiaresborough kept
well to the heights adjoining the castle, and even
to-day there are only a handful of later buildings
down by the river margin. The view, therefore,
is still unspoiled, and its appearance when the
light is coming from the west can be seen in the
illustration given here.
When we have crossed the bridge, and have
passed along a narrow roadway perched well above
tiie river, we come to one of the many interesting
houses that help to keep alive the old-world flavour
of the town. Only a few years ago the old manor-
house had a most picturesque and rather remarkable
exterior, for its plaster walls were covered with a
large black and white chequer-work, and its over-
hanging eaves and trailing creepers gave it a charm
that has since then been quite lost. The restora-
tion which recently took place has entirely altered
the character of the exterior, but inside everything
OLIVER CROMWELL AT KNARESB0R0U6H 127
has been preserved with just the care that should
have been expended outside as well. There are
oak-wainscoted parlours, oak dressers, and richly-
carved fireplaces in the low-ceiled rooms, each one
containing furniture much of the period of the
house. Upstairs there is a beautiful old bedroom
lined with oak, like those on the floor below, and
its interest is greatly enhanced by the story of
Oliver Cromwell's residence in the house, for he
is believed to have used this particular bedroom.
Slight alterations have taken place, but the oak
bedstead which he is said to have occupied, minus
its tester and with its posts cut down to half their
height, still remains to carry us swiftly back to the
last siege of the castle. A very curious story is
told in the GentlemarCs Magazine of March, 1791.
It gives an anecdote of Oliver Cromwell which
Sir John Groodricke used to relate. When he was
quite a small boy, he was told by a very old woman
who had formerly attended his mother. Lady
Goodricke, how Oliver Cromwell came to lodge
at this house when she was but a young girl.
' Having heard so much talk about the man,' she
said, < I looked at him with wonder. Being ordered
to take a pan of coals and air his bed, I could
not, during the operation, forbear peeping over my
1S8 YORESHIKB DALES AND FEU^
shoulder several times to observe this extraordinary
person, who was seated at the fireside of the room
untying his garters. Having aired the bed, I went
out, and, shutting the door after me, stopped and
peeped through the keyhole, when I saw him rise
£rom his feet, advance to the bed and fall on his
knees, in which attitude I left him for some time.
When I returned again I found him still at prayer,
and this was his custom every night so long as he
stayed at our house, from which I concluded he
must be a good man, and this opinion I always
maintained afterwards, though 1 heard him very
much blamed and exceedingly abused/
Higher up the hill stands the church with a
square central tower surmounted by a small spike.
It still bears the marks of the fire made by the
Scots during their disastrous descent upon York-
shire after Edward II.'s defeat at Bannockbum.
Led by Sir James Douglas, the Scots poured into
the prosperous plains and even the dales of York-
shire. They burned Northallerton and Borough-
bridge, and then came on to Knaresborough.
When the town had been captured and burnt, the
savage invaders endeavoured to bum out the in-
habitants who had taken reftige in the church-
tower, but the stoutness of the stone walls pre-
THE SLINGSBY TOMBS 129
vented their efforts to destroy the building. It is
quite possible that the roofe at that time were
thatched, for some years ago much partially-burnt
straw was discovered in the roof. The chapel on
the north side of the chancel contains the interest-
ing monuments of the old Yorkslure femily of
Slingsby. The altar-tomb in the centre bears the
recumbent effigies of Francis Slingsby, who died in
1600, and Mary his wife. Another monument shows
Sir William Slingsby, who accidentally discovered
the first spring at Harrogate. The Slingsbys, who
were cavaliers, produced a martyr in the cause of
Charles I. This was the distinguished Sir Henry,
who, in 1658, 'being beheaded by order of the
tyrant Cromwell, . . . was translated to a better
place.' So says the inscription on a large slab of
black marble in the floor of the chapeL The last
of the male line of the family was Sir Charles
Slingsby, who was most unfortunately drowned
by the upsetting of a ferry-boat in the Ure in
February, 1869.
We can wander through the quaint little streets
above the chiu'ch and find much to interest us,
particularly in the market-place, although quite a
number of the really ancient little houses that had
come down to quite recent years have now passed
17
180 YORKSHIHE DALES AND FELLS
away. On one side of the market-place stands a
most curious little chemist's shop, with two small-
paned windows, very low and picturesque, that
slightly overhang the footway. There seems to be
small doubt that this is the oldest of all the long-
established chemists' shops that exist in England.
It dates from the year 1720, when John Beckwith
started the business, and the conservatism of the
trade is borne out by the preservation of some
interesting survivals of those early Grcorgian days.
There are strangely-shaped old shop-bottles, mortars,
and strips of leather that were used for quicksilver
in the days when it was worn as a charm against
some forms of disease.
Just above the manor-house there is still to be
seen one of the last of the thatched houses, at
one time common in the town. It is the old
Vicarage, and it still contains oak beams and some
good panelling. When we get beyond the market-
place, we come out upon an elevated grassy space
upon the top of a great mass of rock whose per-
pendicular sides drop down to a bend of the Nidd.
Around us are scattered the ruins of Knaresborough
Castle — ^poor and of small account if we compare
them with Richmond, although the site is very
similar ; where before the siege in 1644 there must
AN UNDERGROUND SALLY-PORT 181
have been a most imposing mass of towers and
curtain walls. Of the great keep, only the lowest
story is at all complete, for above the first-floor
there are only two sides to the tower, and these are
battered and dishevelled. The walls enclosed about
the same area as Richmond, but they are now so
greatly destroyed that it is not easy to gain a clear
idea of their position. There were no less than
eleven towers, of which there now remain frag-
ments of six, part of a gateway, and behind the old
courthouse there are evidences of a secret cell.
An underground sally-port opening into the moat,
which was a dry one, is reached by steps leading
from the castle yard. The passage was opened out
in 1890, and in it were discovered a considerable
number of stone balls, probably used for the
' balistas ' mentioned in one of the castle records.
It is a dismal fietct to remember that, despite the
perfect repair of the castle in the reign of Elizabeth,
and the comparatively small amount of destruction
caused during the siege conducted by Lilbume and
Fairfax, Knaresborough's great fortress was reduced
to piles of ruins as the result of an order of the
Council of State not many years after its capture.
Subsequently, as in the case of such splendid
structures as Richard I.'s Ch&teau Gaillard, the
17—2
188 YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
broken remains were cheap building stone for the
townsfolk, and seeing that in those days archa^
ological societies had yet to be instituted, who can
blame the townsfolk ?
Lord Lytton gives a story of the siege that we
may recall, seeing that there is so little to vividly
bring to mind the scene during the strenuous
defence of the castle by the plucky townsfolk.
* A youth,' we are told, * whose father was in the
garrison, was accustomed nightly to get into the
deep, dry moat, climb up the glacis, and put pro-
visions through a hole where the father stood ready
to receive them. He was perceived at length ; the
soldiers fired on him.' The poor lad was made
prisoner, and sentenced to be hanged in quite
medieval fashion within sight of the garrison.
There was, however, a certain lady who, with great
difficulty, prevented this barbarous order from being
carried out, and when the castle had capitulated
and the soldiers had left the boy was released.
The keep is in the Decorated style, and appears
to have been built in the reign of Edward II.
Below the ground is a vaulted dungeon, dark and
horrible in its hopeless strength, which is only
emphasized by the tiny air-hole that lets in scarcely
a glimmering of light, but reveals a thickness of
RICHARD II. AT KNARESBOROUGH 188
15 feet of masonry that must have made a prisoner's
heart sick It is generally understood that Boling-
broke spared Richard II. such confinement as this,
and that when he was a prisoner in the keep he
occupied the large room on the floor above the
kitchen. It is now a mere platform, with the walls
running up on two sides only. The kitchen (some-
times called the guard-room) has a perfectly pre-
served roof of heavy groining, supported by two
pillars, and it contains a collection of interesting
objects, rather difficult to see, owing to the poor
light that the windows allow. The small local
guide-book gives us a thrill by stating that a very
antique-looking chest is 'said to have been the
property of William the Conqueror.' We hope it
was, but long for some proofe. The spring man-
trap is of no great age, and it was in use not many
years ago, when the owner was in the habit of
exhibiting it on market days with a notice upon it
to inform the public that every night he adjusted
its deadly jaws in some part of his orchard. There
is much to interest us among the wind-swept ruins
and the views into the wooded depths of the Nidd,
and we would rather stay here and trace back the
history of the castle and town to the days of that
Norman Serlo de Burgh, who is the first mentioned
184 YORKSHmE DALES AND FELLS
in its annals, than go down to the tripper-worn
Dropping Well and the Mother Shipton Inn.
When we have determined to see what these
* sights' have to oflRer, we find that the inn is a
&irly picturesque one, but with scarcely a quarter
of the interest of the old chemist's shop we saw in
the market-place. The walk along the river bank
among a fine growth of beeches is pleasant enough,
and would be enjoyable if it were not for the &jct
that it leads to a ' sight ' which has to be paid for.
Under the overhanging edge of the limestone crag
hang a row of eccentric objects constantly under
the dripping water that trickles down the face of
the rock, which is itself formed entirely by the
petrifying action of the spring some yards away
from the river. The water being strongly charged
with lime, everything within its reach, including
the row of * curiosities ' in course of manufacture,
are coated over and finally reduced to limestone,
the process taking about two years. When we
have come away from the well we feel we have
seen all the sights we are equal to, and gladly
leave St. Robert's Chapel and the other caves to
be seen at some more convenient season. The
story of Eugene Aram and the murder of Daniel
Clark is a page in the history of Knaresborough
HARROGATE 185
that may perhaps add mterest to the town, but it
is certainly likely to rob the place of some of its
charm, so without wasting any time on a visit to
the cave where the murdered man's body was
buried, we go out on the road to Harrogate.
The distance between the towns is short, and
soon after passing Starbeckwe come to Harrogate's
extensive common known as the Stray. We follow
the grassy space, when it takes a sharp turn to the
north, and are soon in the centre of the great
watering-place. Among the buildings that rise up
in imposing masses on each side of us we can see
no traces of anything that is not of recent date, and
we find nothing at all to suggest that the place
really belongs to Yorkshire.
Walking or being pulled in bath-chairs along the
carefiilly-made paths are all sorts and conditions of
invalids, and interspersed among them are numbers
of people who, if they have any ailments curable
by the waters, are either in very advanced stages
of convalescence or are extremely expert in hiding
any traces of ill-health.
There is one spot in Harrogate that has a sug-
gestion of the early days of the town. It is down
in the corner where the valley gardens almost Join
the extremity of the Stray. There we find the
186 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Royal Pump Room that made its appearance in
early Victorian times, and its circtdar counter is
still crowded every morning by a throng of water-
drinkers. We wander through the hilly streets
and gaze at the pretentious hotels, the baths, the
huge Kursaal, the hydropathic establishments, the
smart shops, and the many churches, and then,
having seen enough of the buildings, we find a seat
supported by green serpents, from which to watch
the passers-by. A white-haired and withered man,
having the stamp of a military life in his still erect
bearing, paces slowly by* then come two elaborately
dressed men of perhaps twenty-five. They wear
brown suits and patent boots, and their bowler hats
are pressed down on the backs of their heads. Then
nursemaids with perambulators pass, followed by
a lady in expensive garments, who talks volubly to
her two pretty daughters. When we have tired
of the pavements and the people, we bid farewell
to them without much regret, being in a mood for
simplicity and solitude, and go away towards
Wharfedale with the pleasant tune that a band was
pla3ang still to remind us for a time of the scenes
we have left behind.
WHARFEDALE
18
CHAPTER VII
WHARFEDALE
Otley is the first place we come to in the long
and beautiful valley of the Wharfe. It is a busy
little town where printing machinery is manu-
&ctured and worsted mills appear to thrive. Im-
mediately to the south rises the steep ridge known
as the Chevin. It answers the same purpose as
Leybum Shawl in giving a great view over the
dale; the elevation of over 900 feet, being much
greater than the Shawl, of course commands a
far more extensive panorama, and thus, in clear
weather, York Minster appears on the eastern
horizon and the Ingleton Fells on the west.
Famley Hall, on the north side of the Wharfe,
is an Elizabethan house dating from 1581, and it
is still farther of interest on account of Turner's
frequent visits, covering a great number of years,
and for the very fine collection of his paintings
preserved there. The oak-panelling and coeval
189 18—2
140 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
furniture are particularly good, and among the
historical relics there is a remarkable memento of
Marston Moor in the sword that Cromwell carried
during the battle.
A few miles higher up the dale stands the big
'hydropathic/ and the station of Ben Rhydding.
The name sounds very Scottish, and the man who
started the establishment came from beyond the
Border. He found that the site he had selected
was marked in the Ordnance maps as a ' bean rhyd-
ding/ or fallow land, so he decided to drop the ' a '
in ' bean/ and in that way get a good Scottish flavour
into the name, and now its origin is being quite
forgotten. Only a short distance beyond is the
considerable town of Ilkley, where hotels and vast
hydropathic establishments flourish exceedingly,
and villas are constantly adding to the size of
the place, which had a population of only 500
half a century ago. Ilkley has an old well-house,
where the water's purity is its chief attraction.
The church contains a thirteenth-century efligy
of Sir Andrew de Middleton, and also three pre-
Norman crosses without arms. On the heights to
the south of Ilkley is Rumbles Moor, and from the
Cow and Calf rocks there is a very fine view.
Ilkley is particularly well situated for walks up
BOLTON ABBEY 141
the dales and over the moors, as a glance at the
map at the end of this volume will show.
About six miles still further up Wharfedale
Bolton Abbey stands by a bend of the beautiful
river. The ruins are most picturesquely placed
on ground slightly raised above the banks of the
Wharfe. Of the domestic buildings practically
nothing remains, while the choir of the church,
the central tower, and north transepts are roof-
less and extremely beautifiil ruins. The nave is
roofed in, and is used as a church at the present
time, and it is probable that services have been
held in the building practically without any in-
terruption for 700 years. Hiding the Early
English west end is the lower half of a fine Per-
pendicular tower, commenced by Richard Moone,
the last Prior. Followers of Ruskin speak of this
as a disfigurement, and I imagine that they also
despise the tower of Fountains Abbey because it
belongs to the same period. The taste displayed
in the architecture and decoration of Brantwood
does not encourage me to accept Ruskin's pro-
nouncements on the latest phase of Gothic develop-
ment, and I need only point to the splendid western
towers of Beverley Minster in support of my in-
tense admiration for the dispised Perpendicular style.
142 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
The great east window of the choir has lost its
tracery, and the Decorated windows at the sides
are in the same vacant state, with the exception
of the one that appears in the illustration given
here. It is blocked up to half its height, like
those on the north side, but the flamboyant tracery
of the head is perfect and very graceful. Lower
down there is some late-Norman interlaced arcad-
ing resting on carved corbels.
There is something singularly attractive in the
views of the woods that overhang the river when
we see them framed by the great stone arches and
fluted piers. We can hear the rich notes of a
blackbird, and the gentle rush of the river where
it washes the stony beach close at hand, and there
is present that wonderful silence that broods over
ruined monasteries.
From the abbey we can take our way by
various beautifril paths to the exceedingly rich
scenery of Bolton woods. Some of the reaches
of the Wharfe through this deep and heavily-
timbered part of its course are really enchanting,
and not even the knowledge that excursion parties
frequently traverse the paths can rob the views of
their charm. It is always possible, by taking a
little trouble, to choose occasions for seeing these
BOLTON ABBEY, WHARFEDALE
From under the axx:hes of the central tower one is
looking out over the course of the river Wharfe.
The abbey was founded in the twelfth century for
monks of the Order of St Augustine.
THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC Library
ASTOR, LENOX AK1>
TILDKN FOUNDATia*
R
BARDEN TOWER 148
beautiful but very popular places when they are
unspoiled by the sights and sounds of holiday-
makers, and in the autumn, when the woods have
an almost undreamed-of brilliance, the walks and
drives are generally left to the birds and the rabbits.
At the Strid the river, except in flood-times, is con-
fined to a deep channel through the rocks, in
places scarcely more than a yard in width. It is
one of those spots that accumulate stories and
legends of the individuals who have lost their
lives, or saved them, by endeavouring to leap the
narrow channel. That several people have been
drowned here is painfully true, for the temptation
to try the seemingly easy but very riisky jump is
more than many can resist.
Higher up, the river is crossed by the three
arches of Barden Bridge, a fine old structure
bearing the inscription : ' This bridge was repayred
at the charge of the whole West R . . . . 1676.'
To the south of the bridge stands the pictiu-esque
Tudor house called Barden Tower, which was at
one time a keeper's lodge in the manorial forest of
Wharfedale. It was enlarged by the tenth Lord
Clifford — the * Shepherd Lord' whose strange
life-story is mentioned in the next chapter in
connection with Skipton — but having become
144 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
ruinous, it was repaired in 1658 by that indefatig-
able restorer of the fiimily castles, the Lady Anne
Clifford,
At this point there is a road across the moors to
Pateley Bridge, in Nidderdale, and if we wish to
explore that valley, which is now partially filled
with a lake formed by the damming of the Nidd
for Bradford's water-supply, we must leave the
Wharfe at Barden. If we keep to the more
beautiful dale we go on through the pretty village
of Bumsall to Grassington, where a branch
railway has recently made its appearance from
Skipton.
The dale from this point appears more and
more wild, and the fells become gaunt and bare,
with scars often fringing the heights on either side.
We keep to the east side of the river, and soon
after having a good view up Littondale, a beautiful
branch valley, we come to KettlewelL This tidy and
cheerful village stands at the foot of Great Whem-
side, one of the twin feUs that we saw overlooking
the head of Coverdale when we were at Middle-
ham. Its comfortable little inns make Kettlewell
a very fine centre for rambles in the wild dales that
run up towards the head of Wharfedale.
Buckden is a small village situated at the
A MOORLAND PATH 146
junction of the road from Aysgarth, and it has
the beautiful scenery of Langstrothdale Chase
stretching away to the west. About a mile higher
up the dale we come to the curious old church
of Hubberholme standing close to the river, and
forming a most attractive picture in conjunction
with the bridge and the masses oi trees just
beyond. At Baisgill we leave the road, which,
if continued, would take us over the moors by
Dodd Fell, and then down to Hawes. The track
goes across Horse Head Moor, and it is so very
slightly marked on the bent that we only follow it
with difficulty. It is steep in places, for in a short
distance it climbs up to nearly 2,000 feet. The
tawny hollows in the fell-sides, and the utter wild-
ness spread all around, are more impressive when
we are right away from anything that can even be
called a path. The sheep just remind us of the
civilization that endeavours to make what use it
can of these desolate places, and when none are in
sight we are left alone with the sky and the heaving
brown hills.
When we reach the highest point before the
rapid descent into Littondale we have another
great view, with Pen-y-ghent close at hand and
Fountains Fell more to the south. At the bottom
19
146 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
of the dale flows the Skirfeu^ and we follow it past
the gray old village of Litton down to Amcliffe,
where there is a nice inn by such a pleasant green
that we are tempted to stay there rather than
hurry on to Skipton.
SKIPTON, MALHAM AND GORDALE
19—2
CHAPTER VIII
SKIPTON, MALHAM AND GORDALE
When I think of Skipton I am never quite sure
whether to look upon it as a manufacturing
centre or as one of the picturesque market towns
of the dale country. If you arrive by train, you come
out of the station upon such vast cotton-mills,
and such a strong flavour of the bustling activity
of the southern parts of Yorkshire, that you might
easily imagine that the capital of Craven has no
part in any holiday-making portion of the county.
But if you come by road from Bolton Abbey, you
enter the place at a considerable height, and, passing
round the margin of the wooded Haw Beck, you
have a fine view of the castle, as well as the church
and the broad and not unpleasing market-place.
Beyond these appear the chimneys and the smoke
of the manufacturing and railway side of the town,
almost entirely separate from the old world and
historic portion on the higher ground. When you
149
160 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
are on the castle ramparts the factories appear much
less formidable — in fact, they seem to shrink into
quite a small area owing to the great bare hills
that rise up on all sides.
On this sunny morning, as we make our way
towards the castle, we find the attractive side of
Skipton entirely unspoiled by any false impression
given by the factories. The smoke which the
chimneys make appears in the form of a thin white
mist against the brown moors beyond, and every-
thing is very clean and very bright after heavy
rain. The gateway of the castle is flanked by two
squat towers. They are circular and battlemented,
and between them upon a parapet, which is higher
than the towers themselves, appears the motto of
the Cliffords, * Desormais ' (hereafter), in open stone
letters. Beyond the gateway stands a great mass
of buildings with two large round towers just in
front ; to the right, across a sloping lawn, appears
the more modern and inhabited portion of the
castle. The squat round towers gain all our atten-
tion, but as we pass through the doorways into the
courtyard beyond, we are scarcely prepared for the
astonishingly beautiful quadrangle that awaits us.
It is small, and the centre is occupied by a great
yew-tree, whose tall, purply-red trunk goes up to
THE COURTYARD OF SKIPTON CASTLE
The buildings of this portion of the castle, although
in such good preservation, are not occupied.
THE NEW YORK
PUBLIC LbRARY
ASTOR. LENOX AND
tlLDKN fOUNDAHOJfS
R L
SKIPTON CASTLE 161
the level of the roofs without any branches or
even twigs, but at that height it spreads out freely
into a feathery canopy of dark green, covering
almost the whole of the square of sky visible from
the courtyard. The base of the trunk is surrounded
by a massive stone seat, with plain shields on each
side. The sunlight that comes through this green
network is very much subdued when it jEsdls upon
walls and the pavement, which becomes strewn
over with circular splashes of whiteness. The
masonry of the walls on every side, where not
showing the original red of the sandstone, has
been weathered into beautiful emerald tints, and
to a height of two or three feet .there is a consider-
able growth of moss on the worn mouldings. The
general appearance of the courtyard suggests more
that of a manor-house than a castle, the windows
and doorways being purely Tudor. The circular
towers and other portions of the walls belong to
the time of Edward II., and there is also a round-
headed door that cannot be later than the time
of Robert de Romill^, one of the Conqueror's
followers. The rooms that overlook the shady
quadrangle are very much decayed and entirely
unoccupied. They include an old dining-haU of
much picturesqueness, kitchens, pantries, and
162 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
butteries, some of them only lighted by narrow
windows on the outer faces of the wall. There
are many large bedrooms and other dark apart-
ments in the towers. Only a little restoration
would be required to put a great portion of these
into habitable condition, for they are structurally
in a good state of repair, as may be seen to some
extent from the picture of the courtyard repro-
duced here. The destruction caused diudng the
siege which took place during the Civil War might
have brought Skipton Castle to much the same
condition as Knaresborough but for the wealth and
energy of that remarkable woman Lady Anne
Clifford, who was bom here in 1589. She was
the only surviving child of George, the third Earl
of Cumberland, and grew up under the care of her
mother, Margaret, Countess of Cumberland, of
whom Lady Anne used to speak as 'my blessed
mother.' Her reverence for the memory of this
admirable parent is also shown in the feeling which
prompted her to put up a pillar by the roadside,
between Penrith and Appleby, to commemorate
their last meeting, and, besides this, the Lady
Anne left a sum of money to be given to the
poor at that spot on a certain day every year.
After her first marriage with Richard Sackville,
THE LADY ANNE CLIFFORD 168
Earl of Dorset, Lady Anne married the profligate
Philip, Earl of Pembroke and Montgomery. She
was widowed a second time in 1649, and after that
began the period of her mmiifieenee and usefulness.
With immense enthusiasm, she undertook the
work of repairing the castles that belonged to her
family. Brougham, Appleby, Barden Tower, and
Pendragon being restored as well as Skipton. We
can see in the towers where the later work begins,
and the custodian who shows us through the apart-
ments points out many details which are invisible
without the aid of his candle.
Besides attending to the decayed castles, the
Countess repaired no less than seven churches,
and to her we owe the carefiil restoration of the
parish church of Skipton. She began the repairs
to the sacred building even before she turned her
attention to the wants of the castle. In her
private memorials we read how, ^ In the summer
of 1665 ... at her own charge, she caus'd the
steeple of Skipton Church to be built up againe,
which was pull'd down in the time of the late
Warrs, and leaded it over, and then repaired some
part of the Church and new glaz'd the Windows,
in every of which Window she put quaries, stained
with a yellow colour, these two letters — viz., A. P.,
20
164 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
and under them the year 1655. • . . Besides,
she raised up a noble Tomb of Black Marble in
memory of her Warlike Father/ This magnificent
altar-tomb still stands within the Comimunion rails
on the south side of the chancel. It is adorned
with seventeen shields, and Whitaker doubted
^ whether so great an assemblage of noble bearings
can be found on the tomb of any other English-
man/ This third Earl was a notable figure in
the reign of Elizabeth, and having for a time been
a great favourite with the Queen, he received
many of the posts of honoiu* she loved to bestow.
He was a skilful and daring sailor, helping to defeat
the Spanish Armada, and building at his own
expense one of the greatest fighting ships of his
time, Elizabeth — ^who, like the present German
Emperor, never lost an opportunity of fostering
the growth of her navy — being present at the
launching ceremony.
The memorials of Lady Anne give a description
of her appearance in the manner of that time:
* The colour of her eyes was black like her Father's,'
we are told, * with a peak of hair on her forehead,
and a dimple in her chin, like her father. The
hair of her head was brown and very thick, and
so long that it reached to the calf of her legs when
* BLOODY CLIFFORD ' 166
she stood upright ; and when she caused these
memorials of herself to be written (she had passed
the year 68 of her age), she said the perfections
of her mind were much above those of Iter body ;
she ,had a strong and copious memory, a sound
judgment, and a discerning spirit, and so much of a
strong imagination in her as that at many times
even her dreams and apprehensions beforehand
proved true.' The Countess died at the great
age of eighty-seven at Brougham Castle in West-
moreland, and was buried in the Church of St.
Lawrence at Appleby.
We cannot leave these old towers of Skipton
Castle without going back to the days of John,
the ninth Lord Clifford, that * Bloody Clifford'
who was one of the leaders of the Lancastrians
at Wakefield, where his merciless slaughter earned
him the title of *the Butcher.' He died by a
chance arrow the night before the Battle of
Towton, so fatal to the cause of Lancaster, and
Lady Clifford and the children took refuge in
her father's castle at Brough. For greater safety
Henry, the heir, was placed under the care of a
shepherd whose wife had nursed the boy's mother
when a child. In this way the future baron grew
up as an entirely uneducated shepherd lad, spending
20—2
166 YORKSfflRE DAIJES AND *TELLS
his days on the fells in the primitive fashion of the
peasants of the fifteenth century. When he was
about twelve years old Lady Clifford, hearing
rumours that the whereabouts of her children had
become known, sent the shepherd and his wife
with the boy into an extremely inaccessible part
of Cumberland. He remained there until his
thirty-second year, when the Battle of Bosworth
placed Henry VII. on the throne. Then the
shepherd lord was brought to Londesborough, and
when the family estates had been restored, he
went back to Skipton Castle. The strangeness
of his new life being irksome to him. Lord Clifford
spent most of his time in Barden Forest at one
of the keeper's lodges, which he adapted for his
own use. There he hunted and studied astronomy
and astrology with the canons of Bolton.
At Flodden Field he led the men-at-arms from
Craven, and showed that by his life of extreme
simplicity he had in no way diminished the
traditional valour of the Cliffords. When he died
they buried him at Bolton Abbey, where many
of his ancestors lay, and as his successor died after
the dissolution of the monasteries, the ' Shepherd
Lord' was the last to be biuied in that secluded
spot by the Wharfe.
*THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE' 167
Skipton has always been a central spot for the
exploration of this southern portion of the dales,
and since the Midland Railway has lately put
out an arm to the north, there are lines going in
five directions. The new branch that goes into
Wharfedale stops just before it reaches Grassington,
and has an intermediate station with a triple name
in consideration of the fact that it is placed at
almost exactly the same distance from the three
villages of Hetton, Rylstone, and Cracoe. Whether
we go by road or rail, we have good views of Flasby
and Rylstone Fells as we pass along the course of
EUer Beck to the romantically situated village
made famous by Wordsworth's ballad of *The
White Doe of Rylstone.' The site of the old
manor-house where the Nortons lived may still
be seen in a field to the east of the church. Owing
to the part they took in the Rising of the North
in 1569 the Nortons lost all their property in
Yorkshire, and among the humble folk of Rylstone
who shared in the rebellion there was Richard
Ejitchen, Mr. Norton's butler, who lost much more,
for he was executed at Ripon. From Hetton we
follow a road to the west, and passing the hamlet
of Winterbum, come to Airton, where there are
some interesting old houses, one of them dating
168 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
from the year of the Great Fire of London.
Turning to the north, we come to Earby Malham,
less than two miles off. It is a pretty little village
with green limestone hills rising on all sides; a
rushing beck connng off Kirby Fell takes its way
past the church, and there is an old vicarage as
well as some picturesque cottages.
We find our way to a decayed lych-gate, whose
stones are very black and moss-grown, and then
get a close view of the Perpendicular church.
The interior is fiill of interest, not only on account
of the Norman font and the canopied niches in the
pillars of the nave, but also for the old pews. The
Malham people seemingly found great delight in
recording their names on the woodwork of the
pews, for carefully carved initials and dates appear
very frequently. All the pews have been cut down
to the accepted height of the present day with the
exception of some on the north side which were
occupied by the more important families, and these
stiU retain their squareness and the high balus-
trades above the panelled lower portions. One
of the parish registers has the rare distinction
of containing Oliver Cromwell's signature to a
marriage. There is also the entry of the baptism
on November 7, 1619, of John Lambert, who
GORDALE SCAR 169
became famous as Major-General in the Romid-
head army.
Just under the moorland heights surrounding
Malham Tarn is the other village of Malham. It
is a charming spot, even in the gloom of a wintry
afternoon. The houses look on to a strip of un-
even green, cut in two, lengthways, by the Aire.
We go across the clear and sparkling waters by a
rough stone footbridge, and, making our way past
a farm, find ourselves in a few minutes at Gordale
Bridge. Here we abandon the switchback lane,
and, climbing a wall, begin to make oiu* way along
the side of the beck. The feUs drop down fairly
sharply on each side, and in the failing light there
seems no object in following the stream any ftirther,
when quite suddenly the green slope on the right
stands out from a scarred wall of rock beyond, and
when we are abreast of the opening we find our-
selves before a vast fissure that leads right into the
heart of the fell. The great split is S-shaped in
plan, so that when we advance into its yawning
mouth we are surrounded by limestone clifis more
than 800 feet high. If one visits Gordale Scar for
the first time alone on a gloomy evening, as I have
done, I can promise the most thrilling sensations
to those who have yet to see this astonishing sight.
160 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
It almost appeared to me as though I were
dreammg, and that I was Aladin approaching
the magician's palace. I had read some of the
eighteenth-century writer's descriptions of the place,
and imagined that their vivid accounts of the terror
inspired by the overhanging rocks were mere
exaggerations, but now I sympathize with every
word. The scars overhang so much on the east
side that there is not much space to get out of
reach of the water that drips from every portion.
Great masses of stone were lying upon the bright
strip of turf, and among them I noticed some that
could not have been there long; this made me
keep close under the cliff in justifiable fear of
another fall. I stared with apprehension at one
rock that would not only kill, but completely bury,
anyone upon whom it fell, and I thought those old
writers had underrated the horrors of the place.
Through a natural arch in the rocks that faced me
came a foaming torrent broken up below into a
series of cascades, and the roar of the waters in the
confined space added much to the fear that was
taking possession of me. It was owing to the
cmious habit that waterfalls have of seeming to
become suddenly louder that I must own to that
sense of fearfulness, for at one moment the noise
GORDALE SCAR
This is one of the most astonishing sights in York-
shire. The gorge is a result of the Craven Fault — a
geological dislocation that has also made the huge
cliffs of Ma) ham Cove. The stream is the Aire. It
can be seen coming through a natural arch high up
among the rocks.
THE NEW YORK
PU-LlCLhRArtTj
-ISTOR. LENOX ASM
TILBEN FOUWBATltas
A FEARSOME GORGE 161
sounded so suddenly diflferent that I was convinced
that a considerable fall of stones had commenced
among the crags overhead, and that in a moment
they would crash into the narrow cleft. Conmion-
sense seemed to urge an immediate retreat, for
there was too much water coming down the falls
to allow me to climb out that way, as I could
otherwise have done. The desire to carry away
some sort of picture of the fearsome place was,
however, triumphant, and the result is given in this
chapter.
Wordsworth writes of
* Grordale chasm, terrific as the lair
Where the young lions couch,^
and he also describes it as one ci the grandest
objects in nature.
A further result of the Craven fault that pro-
duced Gordale Scar can be seen at Malham Cove,
about a mile away. There the cliff forms a curved
front 285 feet high, facing the open meadows down
below. The limestone is formed in layers of great
thickness, dividing the face of the cliff into three
fairly equal sections, the ledges formed at the com-
mencement of each stratum allowing of the growth
of bushes and small trees. A hard-pressed fox is
21
16« YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELI^
said to have taken refuge on one of these pre-
carious ledges, and finding his way stopped in front,
he tried to turn, and in doing so fell and was
kiUed.
At the base of the perpendicular £eu^ of the
cliff the Aire flows fix)m a very slightly arched
recess in the rocic It is a really remarkable stream
in making its d^but without the slightest friss,
for it is large enough at its very birth to be
called a small river. Its modesty is a great loss to
Yorkshire, for if, instead of gathering strength in
the hidden places in the limestone fells, it were to
keep to more rational methods, it would flow to
the edge of the Cove, and there precipitate itself in
majestic fashion into a great pool below. There is
some reason for believing that on certain occasions
in the past the stream has taken the more showy
course, and if sufficient cement could be introduced
into some of the larger fissures above, a fall might
be induced to occur after every period of heavy
rain. All the romance would perhaps disappear if
we knew that the effect was artificial, and therefore
we would no doubt be wiser to remain content with
the Cove as it is.
SETTLE AND THE INGLETON FELLS
21—2
CHAPTER IX
SETTLE AND THE INGLETON FELLS
The track across the moor from Malham Cove to
Settle camiot be recommended to anyone at night,
owing to the extreme difficulty of keeping to the
path without a very great familiarity with every
yard of the way, so that when I merely suggested
taking that route one wintry night the villagers
protested vigorously. I therefore took the road
that goes up from Kirby Malham, having borrowed
a large hurricane lamp from the *Buck' Inn at
Malham. Long before I reached the open moor I
was enveloped in a mist that would have made the
track quite invisible even where it was most plainly
marked, and I blessed the good folk at Malham
who had advised me to take the road rather than
run the risks of the pot-holes that are a feature of
the limestone fells. This moor is on the range
of watersheds of Northern England, for it sends
streams east and west that find their way into the
Irish Sea and German Ocean.
165
166 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
With the swinging lantern throwing vast shadows
of my own figure upon the mist, and the stony road
under my feet, I at length dropped down the steep
descent into Settle, having seen no human being on
the road since I left Kirby Malham. Even Settle
was almost as lonely, for I had nearly reached a
building called The Folly, which is near the middle
of the town, before I met the first inhabitant
In the morning I discovered that The Folly was
the most notable house in the town, for its long
stone fi*ont dates fi*om the time of Charles IL, and
it is a very fine example of the most elaborate treat-
ment of a house of that size and period to be found
in the Craven district. Settle has a most distinctive
feature in the possession of Castleberg, a steep lime-
stone hill, densely wooded except at the very top,
that rises sharply just behind the market-place.
Before the trees were planted there seems to have
been a simdial on the side of the hill, the precipi-
tous sca:r on the top forming the gnomon. No one
remembers this curious feature, although a print
showing the numbers fixed upon the slope was
published in 1778. The market-place has lost its
curious old tolbooth, and in its place stands a town
hall of good Tudor design. Departed also is much
of the charm of the old Shambles that occupy a
SETTLE
This grey old town in Ribblesdale is one of the
quaintest in this part of Yorkshire.
, ^,,"'8 NEW YORK
GIGGLESWICK 167
central position in the square. The lower story,
with big arches forming a sort of piazza in front of
tiie butcher's and other shops, still remains in its
old state, but the upper portion has been restored
in the fullest sense of that comprehensive term.
In the steep street that we came down on enter-
ing the town there may stiU be seen a curious old
tower, which seems to have forgotten its original
purpose. Some of the houses have carved stone
lintels to their doorways and seventeenth-century
dates, while the stone figure on * The Naked Man *
Inn, although bearing the date 1668, must be very
much older, the year of rebuilding being probably
indicated rather than the date of the figure.
The nibble divides Settle firom its former parish
church at Giggleswick, and until 1888 the towns-
folk had to go over the bridge and along a short
lane to the village which held its church. Settie
having been formed into a separate parish, the
parish clerk of the ancient village no longer has the
fees for funerals and marriages. Although able to
share the church, the two places had stocks of their
own for a great many years. At Settle they have
been taken from the market square and placed in
the court-house, and at Giggleswick one of the
first things we see on entering the village is one of
168 YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
the stone posts of the stocks standing by the steps
of the market cross. This cross has a very well
preserved head, and it makes the foreground of a
very pretty picture as we look at the battlemented
tower of the church through the stone-roofed lich-
gate grown over with ivy. The history of this fine
old church, dedicated, like that of Middleham, to
St Alkelda, has been written by Mr. Thomas
Brayshaw, who knows every detail of the old
building jfrom the chalice inscribed * ^ the . com-
MVNION . CVPP . BELONGINGE . TO . THE . PAKISHE .
OF . IyGGELSWICKE . MADE . IN . ANO . 1585 .' tO
the inverted Norman capitals now forming the
bases of the pillars. The tower and the arcades
date from about 1400, and the rest of the structure
is about 100 years older.
*The Black Horse' Inn has still two niches
for small figures of saints, that proclaim its
ecclesiastical connections in early times. It is said
that in the days when it was one of the duties of
the churchwardens to see that no one was drinking
there during the hours of service the inspection
used to last up to just the end of the sermon, and
that when the custom was abolished the church
officials regretted it exceedingly. Giggleswick is
also the proud possessor of a school foimded in
THE VICTORIA CAVE DISCOVERIES 169
1512. It has grown from a very small beginning
to a considerable establishment, and it possesses
one of the most remarkable school chapels that can
be seen anywhere in the comitry. It was built
between 1897 and 1901, as a memorial of Queen
Victoria's ^Diamond Jubilee,' by Mr. Walter
Morrison, who spared no expense in clothing it
with elaborate decoration, executed by some of the
most renowned artists of the present day. The
design of the building is by Mr. T. G. Jackson, R. A.
The museum is of more than ordinary interest
on account of the very fine collection of prehistoric
remains discovered in the Victoria Cave two miles
to the north-east of Settle. Besides bones of such
animals as the cave bear, bison, elephant, and grisly
bear, fragments of pottery were discovered, together
with bronze and silver coins dating from the Roman
period*
An ebbing and flowing well, which has excited
the admiration of all the earlier writers on this
part of Yorkshire, can be seen at about the distance
of a mile to the north of Giggleswick. The old
prints show this as a most spectacular natural
phenomenon; but whatever it may have been a
century or more ago, it appears at the present
day as little more than an ordinary roadside well,
22
170 YORKSHIRE DALES AND PELLS
so common in this neighbouriiood. In very dry
or very wet weather the well remains inactive,
but when there is a medimn supply of water the
level of the water is constantly changing. Giggles-
wick Tarn is no longer in existence, for it has been
drained, and the site is occupied by pastures. The
very fine British canoe, discovered when the drain-
age operations were in progress, is now preserved
in the Leeds Museum.
The road that goes northward from Settle keeps
close to the Midland Railway, which here forces
its way right through the Dale Country, under the
very shoulders of Pen-y-ghent, and within sight
of the flat top of Ingleborough. The greater part
of this country is composed of limestone, form-
ing bare hillsides honeycombed with underground
waters and pot-holes, which often lead down into
the most astonishing caverns. In Ingleborough
itself there is Gaping Gill Hole, a vast fissure
nearly 850 feet deep. It was only partially ex-
plored by M. Martel in 1895. Ingleborough Cave
penetrates into the mountain to a distance of
nearly 1,000 feet, and is one of the best of
these limestone caverns for its stalactite forma-
tions. Guides take visitors fit>m the village of
Clapham to the inmost recesses and chambers
AMONG THE INGLETON FELLS 171
that branch out of the small portion discovered
in 1887.
The fells contain so many fissures and curious
waterfalls that drop into abysses of blackness, that
it would take an infinite time to adequately de-
scribe even a portion of them. The scenery is wild
and gaunt, and is much the same as the moors
at the head of Swaledale, described in an earlier
chapter. In every direction there are opportunities
for splendid mountain walks, and if the tracks are
followed the danger of hidden pot-holes is com-
paratively small. From the summit of Ingle-
borough, and, indeed, from most of the fells that
reach 2,000 feet, there are magnificent views across
the brown fells, broken up with horizontal lines
formed by the bare rocky scars. Bowfell, Whem-
side. Great Shunnor Fell, High Seat, and a dozen
other heights, dominate the lower and greener
country, and to the west, where the mountains
drop down towards Morecambe Bay, one looks
all over the coimtry watered by the Lune and the
Kent, the two rivers that flow from the seaward
side of these lofty watersheds.
22—2
CENT??AL nr?""''V2
INDEX
Addlbbrouoh, 88^ 89
Agincoart, Battle of, 96
Aire, river, 159, 162
Airton, 157
Aislabie, John, 116
Alan Rnf OS of Brittany, first Earl
of Richmond, 18, 29, 32, 33
Alnwick, 35
Alwine, Parson of Wencelaw, 107
Anf lo-Saxon population of York-
shire, 40
Appleby, 152
Castle, 153
Church of St. Lawrence,
155
Aram, Eucene, 134
Arkenffartndale, 60
ArkleBeck, 63
Armada, Spanish, 154
Amcliffe, 146
Aske, family of, 43
Roger de, 59
Askrigg, 65, 86, 89-96, 100, 115
Aysgiurth, 91, 97, 100, 102, 145
Force, 98, 99, 102
Bain. River, 87
Bainbridge, 84, 86, 87, 88, 89, 94,
100
Bangor, Matthew Htitton, Bishop
0^53
Bannockbum, Battle of, 59, 128
Bardale, 84
Beck 85
Barden Bridge, 143, 144,
Forest, 143, 156
Tower, 143, 144, 153, 156
Baogh or Bow Fell, 89
Bayeux tanestry, 40
Beaufort, Margaret, 36
Beckwith, John, 130
Bedale, 13, 32, 38
ScoUand Lord of, 32
Ben Rhydding, 140
Benedictine nous at Marrick, 59
Beverley, 22
Minster, 141
Bishop Dale, 100, 101
Beck, 101
Bolingbroke, 133
Bolton Abbey, 141, 142, 149, 156
Canons of, 156
Castle, 88, 103, 104, 106
lords of, 42, 96«
103
Hall, 104, 105, 106
Woods, 142
Boroughbridge, 128
Bosworth, Battle of, 156
Bow or Baugh Fell, 89, 171,
Bradford, water supply of, 144
Brantwood, Coniston, 141
Brayshaw, Thomas, 168
Bretons, 16, 34, 39, 40
Bridlington, 22
British canoe, early, 170
Brittany, Dukes of, 18, 31, 35,
Brough Castle, 155
HiU, 84
Brougham Castle, 153, 155
Buckden, 144
Pike, 102
Buonaparte, Napoleon, 105, 106
Burgh, Serlo de, 133
Bumsall, 144
Buttertubs Pass, 65, 71-76
173
174
YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Buxton^ 19
Byron^ Lord, 48
Calver Hill, 61
Cam FeU, 84
Gill Beck, 102
Cauterburv, Matihew Hntton,
Archbishop of, 63
Carlow Stone, Semmerwater, 84
Carperby, d7
Castleberg aetUe, 166
Catherine, Queen, widow of
Henry V., 36
Catterick, 32
Cluurles I., 129
II., time of, 166
Ch&teaa Gaillard, 131
Cliemist'B shop, old, at Knares-
boroudb, 130
CTievin, The, 139
Christianity, early, in Yorkshire,
118
Cistercian abbeys, 116, 119
Nuns at Ellerton, 59
Civil War, the, of Charles J., 39,
103, 127, 129, 152, 163, 168
Clapham, 170
Clark, Daniel, 134
Clarkson, C, 23, 24
Cleveland Hills, 82
Clifford, family of, 160, 166
the ninth Lord, 166
Lady, 166, 166
the tenth Lord, 143, 166,
166
the Lady Anne, 144, 162-
166
Clock-making in Wensleydale, 66,
92
Cogden Moor, 68
Commonwealth, time of, 19
Conan, fifth E^l of Richmond,
29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 116
Convers, arms of, 23, 43,
Corfe Castle, Dorsetshire, 110
Com, lack of, iu dales, 64, 81
Cotterdale, 92
Counteraide, 88
Coverdale, 111, 144
Cow and Calf Rocks, Rumbles
Moor, 140
Cracoe, 167
Cragdale, 86
Craven Fault, the, 161
district, 149, 166
men of, 166
Cromwell, Oliver, 127, 128, 129,
140,168
Cumberland, 37^ 166
George, third Earl
of, 162, 164
Margaret, ('Ountees
of, 162
Cumbrian Hills, 4
Dalesmen, 74, 106
Dallowgai Moor, 120
Danish population of Yorkshire,
40
De Burgh, Serlo, 133
De la Mare, Abbot, 106
Decorated Gothic Period, 23, 29,
109, 132, 142
Diamond Jubilee, the, of Queen
Victoria, 169
Dissolution of the Monasteries,
26, 26, 121
Dodd Fell, 81, 82, 89, 146
Domesday Book, 32
Domfront, Normandy, 33
Dorset, Richard Sackidlle, Earl of,
162. 163
Douglas, Sir James, 128
Domiholme, 66, 67
Moor, 66
Dropping well, Knareeborough,
126, 134 ,
Duerley Beck, 81
Durham, 14, 38, 63
Dykes, Oswald, 108
Early English, period of Gothic,
117, 141
Easby Abbey, 40-43, 61, 106, 107
Ebbing and flowing well at Giggles-
wick, 169
INDEX
176
Eden, River^ 66
£dward II., 128
reign of, 132, 151
III., reign of, 35, 37
IV., 109
Prinoe of Wales, only son
of Richard III., 110
Edwin, Earl, 30, 33
EUer Beck (Skipton), 157
EUerton, 59
Elizabeth, Qneen, 53, 154
reign of, 131,
154
Eugene Aram, 134
FairfiuE, Thomas, Lord, 131
Falaiae, Normandy, 33
Fantosme, Jordan, chronicle of,
34
FarmhoQse, the, of the North
Riding, 101
Famley Hall, 139
'Felon Sow of Rokeby, The,' 26,
27,28
Fences, stone, 6
FitK-Hngh, arms of, 23
Fits-Randolph, Robert, 109
Fitz-Ranolph, Radnlph, 28
Masby Fell, 157
Flodden Field, 156
Fors Abbey (Jervanlx), 91
Fountains Abbey, 41, 119, 121, 141
FeU, 145
Fox, George, 88
Franciscans at Richmond, 26, 26,
28
Gaping Gill Hole, 170
Gaunt, John of, 36
Gayle, 81
Gent, Thomas, 116
Gentleman's Magazine, The, 127
Geology, 45, 76, 77
(verman Emperor, William II.,
Ill, 144
German Ocean, 166
Giggleswick, 167, 168, 169
School, 168, 169
Gi^leswick Tarn, 169
GiU Beck (Swaledale), 47
GiUing, 33, 34
East, wapentake of, 33
West, wapentake of, 33
(rillinffshire, 33
Glacid Epochs, 5, 77
Glanville or Glanvile, Randolph
de, 35
Goodricke, Sir John, 127
Gordale Bridge, 159
Scar, 159, 160, 161
Gormire (Thirsk), 85
Grand&ther-docks, 65, 92
Grassington, 144, 157
Gray, Archbishop Walter, 117
Great Central Railway^ 8
Northern Railway, 8
Great Shnnnor Fell, 72, 76, 79,
171
Great Whemside, 111, 144
Greyfriars, Richmond, 25, 26, 28
Griffin, Gilbert, 28
Grinton, 60
Goilds, trade, at Richmond, 37>
38
Hardraw Scar (or Force), 5, 77,
78, 79, 80, 98, 99
Harkerside Af oor, 58
Harrogate, 19, 129, 135, 136
Haw Beck, Skipton, 149
Hawes, 5, 9, 64, 72, 75, 76, 77,
80, 89, 92, 93, 145
Hawes Junction, 63
Heather on the fells, 5
Helvellyn, 83
Henry 11., 34
III., reign of, 43
v., Catherine widow of, 36
VI., play of, 109
VII., 36, 156
reign of, 26
Vlll., reign of, 18, 42
Hetton, 157
Hexham, 118
High Seat, 66, 171
Hobs and wraithes, 74
176
YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Holy Rood (September 27), casUun
commencing at^ 88
Homblower, the^ of Ripon, 116
Horse Head Moor, 145
Houses (farms) of the North Ridings
101
Hubberholme^ 145
Hudswellj 55
Hutchinson, John, 64
Hntton, Matthew, Archbishop of
York (1594), 52
Hutton, Matthew, Archbishop of
Canterbury (1757), 53
Hutton, Captain Matthew, 58
Ice action, 5
nkley, 140
Ingleborough, 3, 76, 170, 171
Cave, 170
Ingleton Fells, the, 139, 170, 171
Irish Sea, 166
Jackson family of Counterside, 88
T. G., R.A., 169
Jervaulx Abbey, 100, 115
John of Gaunt, 36
Jyggelswicke. See Giggleswick
Keld, 65, 66
Kent River, 171
Kettlewell, 144
Kirby FeU, 158
Malham, 158, 165, 166
Kisdon Force, 65
Hill, 65
Kitchen, Richard, 157
Kitchener, Lord, 65
Knappey, 96. See Nappa Hall
Knaresborough, 125-135
Castle, 130433,
152
Manor House,
126, 130
Knight Templars, chapel of, 106,
Knitting in Wensleydale, 91, 92
KnoUys, Sir Francis (1568), 103,
104
Lady's PUlar, 66
Lake District, 4, 63, 66, 82, 83
Lambert, Major- General John,
158, 159
Lancashire, 36
Lancastrians, 155
Langside, Battle of, 103
Langstrothdale, 82, 83, 102,^45
'Lass of Richmond Hill, The,'
ballad of, 36
Lead mines, 60
Leeds Museum, 170
Lehind, John, 18, 22, 24, 26, 33,
59, 81, 97, 99
Leybum, 13, 55, 67, 92, 104, 109,
111, 139
L^bum Shawl, 104, 110, 111
lilbume, of Cromwellian army,
131
Ling, growth o£^ on the feUs,
82
Litton, 146
Littondale, 5, 144, 145
Londesborough, 156
Lune River, 171
Lytton, Lord, 132
Malham, 159, 165
Cove, 161, 162, 165
Tarn, 159
Mare, Abbot de la, brass of, 108
Marrick, 59
Priory, 59
Marske, 51, 52, 65
Beck, 52, 54
HaU, 52, 53, 54
obelisk at, 53, 54
Marston Moor, Battle of, 140
Martel, M., 170
Mary Queen of Scots, 97, 103,
104,105
Masham, 38, 115
Mashamshire Volunteers, 106
Mercia, 34
Metcalfe famUy, 91, 96, 97
James, 96
Thomas, 96
Mickleden, 63
INDEX
1T7
Middleham, 28, 38, 92, 109, 110,
144,168
Middleton, Friar of Richmond, 26,
27
Middleton, Sir Andrew de, 140
Midland Railway, 9, 66, 159,
170
Mill Gill Force, 95, 98
Monasteries, INssolntion of, 25,
26
Moone, Richard, Prior of Bolton,
141
Morecamhe Bay, 171
Morris, Joseph £.,64
Morrison, Walter, 169
Mowhray, Vale of, 30, 31, 106
Muker, 61, 63, 64, 65, 71, 72, 92
Mnrra/s 'Guide to Yorkshire,' 92,
93
Napoleon's threatened invasion of
England, 105
Nappa Hall, 86, 91, 96, 97
Navy, British, 154
Neville, Anne, 110
arms of, 23
fiunily of, 109
Ralph, first Earl of West-
moreland, 36
Newhy Hall, Ripon, 97
Nidd River, 125, 130, 133, 144
Nidderdale, 144
Norman Conquest, 14, 32
period and architecture,
18, 19, 28, 29, 31, 32,
33, 42, 50, 57, 87, 91,
109, 110, 117, 120, 142,
158,168
Northallerton, 128
North-£astem Railway, 9, 14
North Sea, 166
Norton &mily of Rylstone, 157
Ohelisk at Marske, 53
Richmond, 23
Ripon, 116
Old Cam Road, 84
Otley, 139
Parliament, the English, 106
Pateley Bridge, 144
Pemhroke and Montgomery, fjady
Anne, Countess of, 144, 152-155
Pembroke and Montgomery,
Philip, Earl of, 153
Pendragon Castle, 153
Penhill Beacon, 83, 105, 106
Pennine Range, 3, 4
Penrith, 152
Pen-y-ghent, 3, 145, 170
Perpendicular Period, 18, 23, 25,
28, 43, 91, 100, 108, 117, 141,
158
Pickering, 43
PiBgah, Mount, 48
Plagues at Richmond, 37
PotJioles, 67, 71, 74, 75
Pratt, clock-maker at Askrigg, ^
Prehistoric remains, 169
Purbeck, Corfe Castle in Isle of,
110
Quakers at Connterside, 88
Queen's Gap, The, at Leybum
Shawl, 104
Railways in the Dale Country, 8
Rain£m in the dales, 63
Raisgill, 145
Ralph of Rokeby, 26
Randolph, Robert Fits-, 109,
Ranulph, Radulph Fitz-, 28
Raydale, 85
Redmire, 103
Reeth, 51, 52, 53, 60, 61
Ribald, brother of a Norman Earl
of Richmond, 109
Ribble, River, 167
Ribblesdale, 9, 167-171
Richard I., 131
IL, 133
reign of, 18, 36
III., only son of, 110
arms of, 110
Richmond, 13-42, 49, 55, 61, 115,
116
Barley Cross, the, 24
178
YORKSHIBE DALES AND FELLS
Richmond Castle^ 16, 29-37, 39,
42, 130, 131
walk, 19
curfew-bell, 18
Esrla of, 18, 29, 31,
32,36,36,109,116
gatee and walla, 21,
22,24
Holy Trinity Church,
17,33
King's Head Hotel,
17
market-plaoe, 16, 19,
21, 22, 30
may-pole, 24
Mayor andCorporation
of, 16, 24, 60
obeliak, 16, 23
old cross, the, 23, 24
pillory, 24
^agues at, 37
Raral Deanery of, 38
Trade Guilds of, 37, 38
:-po8t, 24
'Richmondshire, History of,' by
H. Speight,
60,97
men of, 36
Rievanlx Abbey, 41
Ripley, Hugh, of Ripon, 118
Ripon, 41, 97, 116-118, 167
Lord (1906), 119
Minster, 117, 118
Rising of the North, the, 167
Road-making, 94
Roald, Constable of Richmond
Castle, 42
Robin Hood's Tower, Richmond
Castle, 31
Robinson, Richard, of Counter-
side, 88
Regan's Seat, 66
Rokeby, Ralph of, 26
'The Felon Sow of,' 26
Roman type of crypt at Ripon,
118
Romans at Bainbridge, 84, 87
at Catterick, 32
Romans at Richmond, 40
near Settle, 169
Romill^, Robert de, 161
Roseberry Topping, 106
Rumblea Moor, 140
Ruakin, John, 141
Rylstone, 167
ballad of the White Doe
of, 167
FeU, 167
Sackville, Richard, Earl of Dorset,
162, 163
Sandmen, Prior Robert, 26
Saxon remains, lack of, at Rich-
mond, 33
or pre -Norman croeses,
140
Scarborough, 39
Scarth NidE, 106
Scolland, Lord of Bedale, 32
Scolland's Hall, Richmond Castile,
32
Scots, defeat of, at Alnwick, 36
raids of the, 36, 37, 69,
128
Scott, Sir Walter, ballad of 'The
Felon Sow of Rokeby,' 26
Scrope, arms of, 23, 108
£unily of, 42, 48, 96, 103,
106,108
Richard, Lord of Bolton,
106
Sir Henry le, 42
Sir William le, 42
ninth Lord, 108
tombs, 42
Sedbergh, 62
Semmerwater, 84-88
Settle, 9, 166-167, 169
Shakespeare's play of ' Henry VI.,'
109
Shambles at Settle, 166
Sharp, Roger. 38
Sheep, Wensleydale, 116
Sheliey, Percy B., 90
Shene, Surrey, 36
Shrovetide, 88
INDEX
179
Simon de Wenselawe^ Sir, 106
Skell^ River, 119
Skipton, 9, 14, 143, 144, 146,
149-157
Castle, 150-156
Skirfiure, River, 146
Slinger, a woman of Cotterdale,
92
Slingsby, £unily of, 129
Francis, 129
Mary, 129
Sir Charles, 129
Sir Henry, 129
Snowstorms in the dales, 83
South Africa, 7
Spanish Armada, 154
Speiffht, Harry, 83, 87, 97
St. Aflatha's Abbey, Easby, 40
St Alban's Abbey, 108
St. Alkelda, churches dedicated
to, 110, 168
St. Anne, chantry to, at Askrigg^,
91
St Martin's Priory at Richmond,
28,42
St Mary's Abbey at York, 28
St Nicholas, Chapel of, in Rich-
mond Castle, 31
St Pancras Station, London, 9
St Robert's Chapel, Knares-
borough, 134
St Wilfrid's Needle, Ripon, 118
Stag's Fell, 65
Stake FeU, 83
Starbeck, 135
Starbottom, 102
Storms in the doles, 62, 63, 83
Stray, the, at Harrogate, 135
Strid, the, 143
Studley Royal, 119 /
Swale, River, 20, 21, 41, 48-67
Swaledale, 8, 13, 47-64, 83
Swine Cross, Middleham, 110
Tees, high force on the, 99
Teesdale, 64
Templars, Knight, chapel of, 106
Thames River, 36
Thirsk, 106
Waiiam, last Abbot of
Fountains Abbey, 121
Thondby, 100, 101
Thornton, WUliam (Askrigg), 90
Tibetot, arms of, 23
Tmtem Abbey, 41
Tor Mere Top, 102
Towton, HaUle of, 155
Tudor, Edmund, 36
Turner, J. W. M., 59, 84, 139
Ure, River and Valley of, 43, 71,
80, 89, 97-99, 102, 107, 109,
115, and see Wensl^dale
Uredale, 81, and see Wensleydale
Vale of Mowbray, 31, 106
of York, 6
Victoria Cave, 169
Queen, 169
Volunteers, Wensleydale, eto.,
105,106
Wakefield, Batde of, 155
Wakemen, the, of Ripon, 117,
118
Walbum Hall, 57
Wymerde, 57
Waldendale, 102
Walker, George, 91
Warwick, arms of, 110
the KingHnaker, 109
Watershed of EngLuid, 166, 171
Watling Street, ^
Wayne. Christopher, 23
Wencelaw. See Wensley
Wenselawe. See Wensley
Wensley, 106, 107, 110
Wensleydale, 5, 43, 64, 65, 71-111,
115
Forest of, 87
West Burton, 100
Westmoreland, 37, 63, 66, 101,
155
Ralph NeviUe,
first Earl of, 36
Wether Fell, 82-84, 89
180
YORKSHIRE DALES AND FELLS
Whaley, Mr., of Aakrigg, 91
Wharfe, River, 130, 141, 142, 144,
156
Wharfedale, 5, 102, 136, 139-146
Forest of, 143
Whemside, 171
Great and Little, 111
Whitaker, Dr. , Historian of Craven
and Richmond^ire, 24, 25, 76,
154
Wliitdiffe Scar, 47-49, 53
Whitfield Force, 96
Widdale FeU, 89
Wilfrid, 118
WiUance, Robert, 49, 50
WiUanoe's Leap, 49, 54
William the Conqueror, 18, 33, 34,
133, 151
the lion of Scotland, 34
Winterbum, 157
Wodenslag. See Wensley
WoodhairPark, 97
Wordsworth, WUliam, 157, 161
Wraithea and hobs, 74
Wyatt, the architect, 117
Wyman, dapifar to the Earl of
Richmond, 28
York, 22, 28
Archbishopric of, 53
Minster, 139
Vale of, 6
CEiri
7E
Biuuna AXD Bona, uianD, PRumsBi qvildford
^ir:
\
I'
.';i;'\M'.-o' ^